Bella's Boyfriend
by AmandaForks
Summary: The sequel to Bella's Guitar
1. Chapter 1

Hello! Welcome to _Bella's Boyfriend,_ the sequel to _Bella's Guitar._ If you haven't read _Bella's Guitar,_ please read that first. _Bella's Boyfriend_ resumes the storyline on the morning after the end of _Bella's Guitar._

This story is rated M for mature content. The Twilight characters and world are the intellectual and creative property of Stephenie Meyer. I am not profiting from this work of fan fiction.

Enjoy!

* * *

 ** _BELLA'S BOYFRIEND_**

Chapter One

"The Morning After"

Bella awoke to the strangest sound. For a moment she thought it was a seagull. There was a brightness to it, a sudden, high-pitched, chicken-like _be-gawk!_ Then it sounded different, lower-pitched, a shuddering yawp, a sibilant gasp. A sure sign of the heebie-jeebies. She sat up. And she was promptly thwacked across the face with something big and fluffy.

"Dad?" she squawked.

"Yee-ow!" he said. "Yip! Yow! Yoooow-eeesh!" Each of these statements was punctuated by the pillow he aimed at his daughter's head. _Fwap. Fwap. Ffffffwap._

"Dad?!"

 _Fwap._

It was still dark outside, and it was dark in her room. Bella tried to look at her alarm clock, but she was struck across the face with the pillow again. Was it five a.m.? Or six?

"Dad, what are you—?"

 _Fwap._ "It's a rat!"

"A rat?"

"In your bed!" _Fwap._

"A rat!" She kicked the covers off her feet. "Where?! Where?!"

"In your bed!" _Fwap! Fwap!_

Squealing, Bella spun around on her bottom. Her bare feet fluttered in the air above a long, dark, hairy thing on the mattress. She squealed again and tried to leap away, but Charlie thwacked her with the pillow and she fell between the bed and the wall, landing on her shoulder as her legs and her quilts piled on top of her. The dark thing slid off the mattress as well.

"It's touching me!" she cried. "It's touching me!"

Charlie shoved her bed away from the wall and whipped her quilts off of her. "Yeee-oowww-iiiishhh!" When no rat scuttled away, he dropped the quilts and stomped all over them. Bella cringed, waiting for a squeak and a crunch, but as her father stomped and stomped and nothing happened, she sat up and looked around. It was under the bed.

"Quick! Dad! There it is!"

Charlie grabbed her bedpost and lifted her bed halfway off the floor in a single-handed feat of strength and adrenaline. His slippered foot found its quarry. _Stomp! Stomp! Stomp!_

"Oh, you're killing it!" cried Bella. Her own adrenaline rush went straight to the part of her heart that loved little animals. "Don't kill it!" she wailed.

Charlie stomped it anyway until he was sure it wasn't moving. Then he turned on the light.

Blinking up at him from the yellow hardwood floor, his daughter lay in a tangle of pink-flowered bedsheets. Her hair was snarled to three times its usual volume, her eyes were bleary, and her white "Save the Whales" nightshirt had slipped off one shoulder, exposing her skinny collarbone and a collection of tiny purple—

"What's that on your neck?" he said.

Bella tucked her chin and twisted her head, but she couldn't see what he meant.

"Right there." His eyebrows rushed together as the adrenaline found a new target. "What's that on your neck, young lady?"

Bella licked her finger and rubbed it on her neck. "Is it coming off?" She moved her nightshirt and rubbed her hands all over her neck and shoulders and upper chest. Charlie's eyes flared, and his skin went pinker and pinker and then bone white. "It's not coming off, is it?" said Bella.

Her father closed his eyes and counted to at least fifty. When he opened them, he moved his slipper and picked up the rat: a long, black, heavy lock of hair secured by a rubber band at one end.

Without a word, he strode across the hall and returned with a handheld mirror from the bathroom. He tossed it at her, and she gaped at herself in bewilderment. Her neck, shoulders, upper chest, and even parts of her forearms, near her wrists, were decorated with small purplish brown or pink blotches. Amazing. What was this? For a moment she wondered if she'd caught some weird illness—it was that bad—and she touched her skin gingerly. Several places felt tender. How could this have—

 _Oh._

Charlie tossed the hair at her, too. "Did this come from the same place?"

She nodded.

He shut the door when he left.

It was 6:42 a.m. The red numbers of her alarm clock glowed softly when she turned off the light. Bella flopped her quilts back on the bed. She took more care with the hair, combing it smooth with her fingers and placing it on her pillow again. Then she lay on her back, tracing her fingers over the tender spots on her neck and shoulders. She touched her face, too. It felt strange. She realized it was because there was a huge, fat, idiotic grin on it that wouldn't go away. Stretching luxuriously, she enjoyed the sensation of pointing her toes, arching her back, and feeling her ribcage rise. She liked the feeling of the taut skin on her stomach, too, and the awareness she had of her hip bones. It felt good to wiggle them as she got comfortable in her bed again. Between her white curtains, the slimmest streak of peach had appeared in the sky. She rolled to her side to look at it and touched her neck again.

 _Wow. Just... Wow._

* * *

Breakfast was a little uncomfortable. Charlie sat across from her at the table, alternately glaring into his coffee cup and opening his mouth to speak, then closing it again. He also squeezed his eyes shut, over and over, and looked out the window with big, slow blinks. But mostly, there was the glaring.

Bella poured milk on a bowl of raisin bran and sat down as carefully and quietly as she could. The sound of her spoon moving through the crunchy cereal flakes seemed obnoxious.

Thank goodness for turtleneck sweaters. Wearing one felt ridiculous, like something teenagers from the nineteen-fifties did, and even then only in movies. But here in Forks, on February 21, 2006, it proved to be a time-tested solution. In her closet she had found a brand-new, light blue, cotton cable knit sweater with the tags still on. Had Renee sent it to her last Christmas? She couldn't remember much from her zombie days. But now she was glad to have it. She pulled the cuffs down past her wrists and nudged the neckline as high as it would go. Then she nibbled at her cereal and waited.

 _It's not like I did anything wrong,_ she told herself. She also thought, _If he glares at that coffee any harder, it'll burst into flames._ She snorted, just once, with laughter. It made Charlie stand up suddenly.

"This is really bad timing, Bella. Really bad." He pulled open a drawer to get a ballpoint pen and a pad of paper. Smacking the drawer shut, he sat down across from her again and made a diagram of what he told her was "shit I have to think about."

He proceeded to draw a pie chart from hell.

On the yellow legal paper, he drew a large circle and sliced it in half with a vertical, angry black line. One half of the circle he labeled "Reality." In it, he wrote, "Two dead hikers. Thirty-two bags of body parts. Crying relatives flying here from Cincinnati. No suspects." He scratched these words into the paper so fiercely that the pen broke through in one place. Bella cringed to think about the thirty-two separate bags. It sounded familiar. She tried to remember where she had heard that before.

"And this," continued Charlie, "is eating up the other half of my brain." He labeled the second half of the circle "Possibilities" and filled it with a list that read, "What's Sam hiding? Killer bear in the woods? Did Dorsic see something out there? Serial killer/survivalist? Should I call the FBI?"

He pushed the paper in front of her, saying, "Look. Look at what I have to think about!" Then he drew two squares next to the large circle. He labeled one "daughter dating" and the other "Edward killed someone." He made several forceful arrows pointing to the circle. _Scratch, scratch, scratch_ went his pen.

"What's this?" he demanded, pointing to the Edward square. Bella felt her face go pale. The sun was up outside, but the kitchen light was still on, making the yellow paper look yellower, more urgent, in its artificial glow. Charlie's words were written in all capital letters, with short, hard strokes. "What the hell is this, Bella? Is this connected? Because I might need to make a bigger circle."

He scrawled around and around his pie chart. It looked like a tornado.

"And now this?"

She looked at the "daughter dating" box, off to the side of that mess.

"No," said Charlie. "Abso-fucking-lutely not."

He got up, shoved the pen and paper back into the drawer, and slapped it shut. In the living room, she heard him open the coat closet. He came back and shoved her coat at her, telling her to go to work and come straight home when she was through.

* * *

When Bella arrived at work, Mrs. Newton gave her a big smile.

"Why, sweetie," she said. "You came!"

"Uh, hi?" said Bella.

Mike was at home. As Bella had guessed, he was too sick to work. But she had come to fill in before Mrs. Newton could call her. This act, she gathered from Mrs. Newton's astonishment, was called "taking initiative." She got the impression it was a good thing. So she got a bucket and mop and went to clean the restroom without being asked. After that, Mrs. Newton set her to work in the camping section.

In order to make room for a new display, four shelves had to be emptied. Bella kept the merchandise organized as she stacked it up on the floor: sleeping bags, camping stoves, small propane tanks, dehydrated meals, water purification systems, and more. Then the empty shelves had to be shoved closer together and restocked. Mr. Newton, thank goodness, came out of the accounting office to help with the shoving. He was a slim but sturdy man with sandy blond hair and blue eyes, like Mike. After they created more floor space, Mrs. Newton asked Bella to set up a tent.

"Like this?" she asked, pointing to a small box. The photo on the box showed two happy campers on a mountaintop beside an adorable green backpacking tent. It was called "The Grasshopper."

"No," said Mrs. Newton. "Let's show off our best model." She pointed to a box about the size of Bella's locker at school. The photo showed a family of eight posing next to an enormous, candy-red, three-room contraption. Two of the tent's zippered windows were open. Two more children—a pair of twin girls with pigtails—poked their heads out of one window, grinning with identical glee, and a pair of golden retrievers stood panting out of the other window. The tent was called "Pemberley." In the background of the photo, a pickup truck towing a horse trailer was kicking up dust as it rolled into the campground.

Assembling Pemberly took the rest of the morning. It had many poles, windows, screens, sections, and three interior rooms. It had a rainfly so big that if it were an American flag, it would have been suitable for hoisting over a U.S. Navy aircraft carrier, and when she dragged it all out of the box and spread it on the floor, it looked like a parachutist had crash landed. Well, she thought, if Mr. Darcy ever went camping, he'd probably have a tent like this.

As she worked, she thought about Charlie. His reaction surprised her. He liked Jacob, didn't he? There were times when it seemed like he thought Jacob was the greatest thing since sliced bread. It used to make her mad. She'd be visiting, as a little girl, and Charlie would say things like, _Oh, look, Jacob can roller skate. Would you like me to buy you some roller skates, Bells?_

That had ended badly.

She threaded the long, flexible tent poles through their sleeves and crawled into the flat tent, trying to lift it into position from the inside.

Maybe, she thought, Charlie would have reacted better if she and Jacob could have eased him into the idea. They could have talked about it. Or she and Jacob could have simply stood in front of him until the change in their friendship became apparent. It wouldn't have taken long. She imagined Charlie looking between the two of them with his eyebrows squinched up, kind of low over his nose, and then he would frown a little... And then everything would have been okay. Right? But maybe the sight of her neck this morning looking like... well, like it looked... Maybe that would make any parent flip out.

That slow, stupid smile returned to her face as she thought about what her neck looked like.

 _Jacob, Jacob, Jacob..._

Were things different now between them? She crawled through the tent, squirming beneath the poles that wiggled and flapped above her. Light through the red fabric made the tent seem like a giant heart; she crept into each chamber, unzipping the windows for air. What would happen when she saw him again? Would she turn pink immediately? Would he? Her hands were pink now, tinted by the red light, as she rolled the window coverings down and tied them in place. Would his smile look different? Would it look as stupid as her own?

 _Probably stupider,_ she thought. _But just barely._

She rolled onto her back and let the red fabric flutter over her body. It was nylon, but it felt like silk as it slid over her face and hands and neck. Arching her back, she stretched luxuriously, turning from side to side. She remembered his hands on her shoulders, and his lips, and his warmth, and the scent of his skin and hair. Just thinking about it made shivers run through her. She had never felt this way before, and it felt so _good._ So _alive._ And then thinking about the feeling of being _alive_ brought her contrasting memories of Edward, whose lips were made of stone.

 _Screw you, Edward._

Even with no one to see her in the tent, she covered her mouth with her hands. But then she thought it again— _Yeah, screw you, Edward—_ and she breathed hard into her cupped hands. _You can't take this from me!_

For the first time, she was glad he left. Even though she had struggled through her terrible heartache, she was still glad. Now she had friends. She had a father. And she had a freaking fantastic feeling after last night on the porch. _This is MINE,_ she thought. _And you can't have it._ Then she wanted to laugh, and she kicked her legs, drumming her heels on the floor as the tent fabric rustled above her. _Mine!_

Jacob was _not_ going to push her away next time she wanted to kiss him. She was pretty sure. She felt all shivery again and had to roll onto her stomach. Then she rolled back, stretched more, and rolled around and around in the tent, enjoying the sensation of fabric sliding over her skin and the rich, red light.

"Bella?" said Mrs. Newton after a while. "Are you okay?"

She waved her arms and legs as if making a snow angel.

* * *

At home again, Bella made dinner for Charlie. She had worked at Newton's till six o'clock, half-ashamed of the fact that she was avoiding her father, and half-defiantly pleased with herself for having a job that allowed her to earn money while avoiding her father. While working, she had also managed to avoid Jessica Stanley, who stopped by the store looking for Mike. From behind a bookcase, she saw Jessica peek down a few aisles. Mrs. Newton confronted her.

"Jessica." Her smile was tight. "Haven't seen you in a while."

Jessica murmured a hello. She said she had seen Mike last night at the movies in Port Angeles, and she wanted to know if he was feeling well.

"At the movies. Yes. He went with Bella. And he told me you were there with—"

"With someone else," Jessica said cautiously. "But I don't think I'll be seeing him anymore." She spoke quietly, but her chin went up.

Mrs. Newton did not uncross her arms from her chest, but after a moment, she suggested that Jessica come back tomorrow. "Mike might be feeling better then."

Bella sighed with relief when Jessica left, but then, as she was straightening some photography books, she began to frown. She didn't like the way Mrs. Newton said that Mike had gone to the movies with her. Yes, he had, but he also went with Angela, Jacob, and Quil. Was Mrs. Newton confused about her friendship with Mike? Or was she trying to tell Jessica to forget about him? Why did she have to pull Bella into this? Was Mike's mom another factor in the multiplication of Jessica's suspicious dislike?

 _Darn it. Double dog-gone darn it!_

This felt like a game Bella didn't want to play. She hadn't known she was playing, and maybe that's why she had been losing. Mrs. Newton had never acted like she wanted Bella and Mike to get together, so she could only guess that Mrs. Newton mentioned her to dissuade a girl who had been making her son unhappy.

 _But what about me?_ she thought. _I am not a pawn._ She shoved the books into place a little too brusquely. _Unnecessary roughness,_ she could imagine Quil saying.

She frowned and frowned at the books. And she realized, after a while, that part of her irritation was related to Renee. Bella didn't have a mother who would defend her from skanks. But Mike had one. A nosey, bossy, freedom-limiting, discouraging, wrinkly old mom who actually gave a flying fig about him. She wondered if Mike would laugh or grimace if she told him he was kind of lucky.

At six o'clock, after a whole day of Bella asking if there wasn't anything else she could do—Pemberly was looking surprisingly good, after the Newtons had helped her—Mike's mom dismissed her.

Now she stood in Charlie's kitchen, browning half a pound of ground beef for tacos.

The sizzling in the pan seemed the only sound in the house. She added garlic, cumin, chili powder, salt, and pepper. Then she chopped a quarter of an onion and added that, too. The scent stung her eyes. She had to open the freezer and stick her face in there, letting the cold air soothe her.

As she worked, she watched her father out of the corner of her eye. He had cleared the table and even removed the table cloth, replacing it with a huge, awkward sheet of white paper, and now he was busy with what she could only imagine was something awful. There were magic markers involved.

Bella picked up the phone and dialed Angela's number, stretching the cord across the kitchen so she could keep her spatula in the pan. Mrs. Weber answered.

"Hi. Is Angela there?"

Her mother said yes, she was, but that she had the flu and was sleeping.

"Oh. I'm sorry. That's why I called. She threw up last night."

"And this morning. And this afternoon." Mrs. Weber said she'd likely be sick for a few days, and she asked if Bella were feeling all right.

"I'm okay."

"Well, don't come to visit. She's probably contagious. I'll tell her you called. Stay healthy!"

Bella said goodbye and glanced at Charlie again. He was drawing. She also glanced at the answering machine, whose little red light was not blinking.

"Dad? Did— Um, did Jacob call today?"

He glared at her.

 _Why can't we have more than one phone in this house?_

She grimaced as she dialed Jake's number, turning her back on her father to hide her blush. In Billy's house, the phone rang and rang and rang. After a couple minutes, she gave up, turned the burner off on the stove, and began chopping lettuce and tomatoes. She found some shredded cheddar cheese in a bag in the fridge. When she carried their meal to the table, she stopped in surprise. On the paper that covered the whole table, Charlie had drawn an exactingly detailed and impeccably proportioned outline of the Olympic Peninsula.

"Sit," he ordered. "And keep your tacos off of Hoquiam."

Her blood ran suddenly cold. She sank slowly into her chair as her father darkened the lines of the western coast with a black marker. Then, with an orange one, he made a dotted boundary around the national park.

"Impressive," she managed. "How do you know how to—"

"Because I've lived here for thirty-two years," he drawled. And then, presumably, to show off, he added a few of the islands off the coast. A large one off Cape Flattery. A couple of smaller ones near La Push. One of them he labeled, "Akalat." He had oriented this giant map so she sat near the southern end of the peninsula, looking north. Her tacos, indeed, were infringing on Hoquiam.

"I shouldn't be doing this," Charlie said. "So much of this is classified. But I'm on the edge of something, and I'm starting to think that after all this time, one of the biggest clues has been right here in front of me."

"In Forks?"

"No." His brown eyes held hers. "In my house."

It was hard to swallow with Charlie looking at her like that.

Her father, however, ate quickly and deliberately. He drew quickly, too, his hands swishing over the map as he added towns in black, rivers in green, the contours and peaks of Mount Olympus in blue, and the Indian reservations in purple. There were a lot more of those than she'd realized. Clockwise, starting at the noon position in Port Angeles, were the lands of the Lower Elwha Klallam, the Jamestown S'Klallam, the Port Gamble S'Klallam, the Suquamish, the Skokomish, the Quilnault, the Hoh, the Quileute, and the Makah, rounding out the circle at about ten o'clock, on the northwest tip of the peninsula. It was, Charlie told her, the westernmost point in the lower forty-eight states.

"Neat, huh?" he said dryly.

Bella felt as if she were backed up on those cliffs.

Charlie extended each tribal territory beyond the modern reservation boundaries, using purple dotted lines to show historical possession. Truly, the Quileutes' land included many more miles of sea coast and vast swaths of forest, sweeping all the way to the top of Mount Olympus. She had once gazed in boredom at a poster of this territory in the La Push Community Center; however, seeing it now on Charlie's table sent shivers through her. Forks was part of that territory. But Forks was a modern speck in a vast, ancient landscape. When Charlie included the Hoh tribe's holdings (they were relatives of the Quileutes, he reminded her), the Hoh Rainforest, its parkland, trails, and visitor center were also part of Quileute territory. So was was the Hoh River.

"Here," said Charlie, tracing the Hoh River Trail in red, "is where we lost the first one. The female hiker, a couple weeks ago." He made an X. "Here's where Sam found the other hiker, yesterday morning." A second X. "And here's where my friend died, last spring." He made a final X for Waylon, who was found dead in his boat on the Hoh River near Forks. "Animal attack." Each corpse, he reminded her, was more gruesomely mauled than the last. It was nearly impossible to identify the victims.

"But maybe that's the point. It's also nearly impossible to tell how they died."

"The point?"

"If there's a point to it, then it was done on purpose."

Bella's eyes filled with tears. To her surprise, Charlie's did, too. He held her gaze, though, and she watched his skin redden and his mustache tremble, just once, as a single tear rolled down his cheek.

"Bella. Please help me."

She couldn't speak.

Charlie kept drawing. " _Huge gray bear,_ " he recited from one of his files, " _spotted February 6 in the Queets River Valley._ " Bella felt more frightened as she realized that he'd memorized these words. Her father remembered a lot of things. Quite accurately. It was one of many reasons why he was the Chief. " _Ran across the river approximately one a.m._ ," he continued. " _Estimated size, eight feet long. Five feet high. Long tail. Witnesses, itinerant campers._ " He sketched a bear in a river valley south of Forks, giving it gray fur and a long tail.

"That look like a bear to you?"

"No," she whispered.

He drew a big red paw print next to the bear and more paw prints next to each of his X's for the animal attacks. "If there's a point to it," he said again, "it was done on purpose." Then he looked at his hand, opening and closing his fingers. "I'm going out of my mind." More forcefully, he said, "I'm going out of my _mind_ , Bella. You think I can sit across from the sheriff in Port Angeles and show him _this?_ I need you to help me."

She smudged away her tears with her napkin as Charlie became more agitated. He made two columns of clues on the side of his map. In one column: _bear. paw prints. animal attack._ In the second column: _this was done on purpose._

"What kind of animal does things like this? On purpose? Why do I keep thinking this was done on purpose?"

He added more clues to his map, including another paw print for the huge, half-seen animal Matt Hathaway nicked on its hind quarters on February 13, also in the Hoh River Valley.

"There's an animal. These people are shredded. My friend—"

"Oh, Dad—"

"My friend is dead! You know something, don't you?"

"I can't—"

"You _can!"_ He slapped the table. "Is this killer trying to make it _look_ like an animal did this? Maybe. But there's definitely an animal out there. A killer. And an animal. They might or might not be the same."

Bella got up and put all of their dishes in the sink. Dinner was over. Charlie commanded her to sit down again as he unfolded a slip of yellow notebook paper from his pocket.

" _Edward killed someone,_ " he read.

"Oh, Dad, no."

"I wrote it down as soon as I could. I think I remembered everything. Yesterday morning, you said, _Edward killed someone. It was a long time ago. He didn't love me. He loved someone else. There was a tree. Her brother. A piano. A yearbook. A wedding dress. A hungry baby. It was a logging accident."_ He put down the paper gently. "It was a long time ago," he repeated. "Bella, what do you know about this?"

"I can't tell you."

"Did Edward kill these people? These hikers? My friend?"

"No."

"But he did kill someone."

Bella cupped her hands over her mouth and nose as tears spilled from her eyes. Her heart was pounding so badly that she couldn't stand, no matter how much she wanted to run away. Her kitchen, this table, her father... everything seemed to hover in the air, ungrounded. The room began to spin.

"You can tell me," said her father. Then his face went pale, and his own eyes watered again. "Oh, Bella," he managed. "You can't tell me. You can't. Oh, honey, are you... involved? Is this why?"

She stared at him.

"Oh, my poor girl! The nightmares. Your withdrawal, your depression. It's guilt!"

"What?"

"I'll recuse myself. I'll step aside from this case. I'll get you a lawyer." He gave a harsh, choked sob into his hands and lay his face on the table, his shoulders shaking.

"No!" cried Bella. She moved into the chair beside him and put her arms around him. "No, I didn't hurt anyone."

"Did they hurt you? Did Edward— That night in the forest— Did he—"

"No! No, Dad, I'm okay. That didn't happen."

"I'll kill that boy!"

"No, no, it's nothing like that!"

Charlie shuddered, sat up, and wiped his arm across his face. She scooted her chair closer as he hugged her against his side, putting his chin on the top of her head. For a long moment, he didn't speak. Bella pressed her face into his shoulder, feeling the unevenness of his breathing. After a while he whispered that he could probably make it look like an accident. It was his way of calming himself, she understood. To make a joke. Neither of them could smile about it, though.

She stared at his map and the crumpled yellow paper.

"Why can't you tell me?"

She bit her lip. It was so tempting.

Slowly, Charlie spun the map so they were both looking north again. Five red pawprints: two for the hikers, one for Waylon, one in the Queets River Valley, and one along the Hoh. She felt afraid, sick, and confused. If a vampire were in the woods, killing these people, then what were these paw prints? Charlie kept his arm around her; she pressed her face to his shoulder and his soft, green flannel shirt. He smelled like coffee and aftershave and chili powder. Squeezing her eyes shut, she tried not to think of him going into the woods again for the investigation. What would she do to keep him out of there? Tell the truth?

"Edward killed someone," he said quietly. "Does Dr. Cullen know?"

"Probably," she whispered.

Charlie swore. "Where did this happen?"

She was silent.

"In Forks?"

"No."

"Were the police involved?"

"No."

"Do you know of any reason why any person, anywhere, is in danger right now?"

"No."

"You promise? If you know of a threat to anyone's safety, anything at all, you have to tell me."

"There's nothing. Nothing."

They spent the rest of the evening silently watching basketball. The Huskies were terrible, as usual. Charlie scooped big bowls of chocolate ice cream for each of them and sat beside her on the couch instead of in his recliner.

* * *

Mike was at work in the morning. Bella was surprised to find him in the camping section, pulling sleeping bags out of their stuff sacks and clipping hangers onto the foot ends. He was hanging them upside down from a cable his parents had strung along a wall. Bella helped him attach labels to each bag. They were rated for bulk, warmth, type of filling material, and cost, of course. One of the women's bags, she noticed, had extra insulation near the feet.

"Good idea, right?" said Mike. "Girls' feet get colder at night."

"I guess so."

"It says so on the tag, anyway." He swayed a little as he stretched to hang up the bag.

"You okay?"

"Just a little tired."

She helped him display one example from each model of sleeping bag. As she hung them up, she imagined a vampire hanging from the ceiling like a bat, sleeping upside down. She almost laughed to think of how wrong Hollywood was, but then she just ended up feeling nervous again, thinking of Charlie and the investigation.

At lunch time, she and Mike walked next door to the grocery store and bought a couple of microwave meals. They heated them in the employee break room and sat at the table there, having macaroni and cheese and Dr. Pepper.

"Jessica came by yesterday," she said.

"Really?"

"Your mom didn't mention this?"

"No."

"Well, your mom told her we went to the movies together."

"Which we did."

"No, I mean, she made it sound like a date."

Mike frowned.

"Jessica hates my guts, I swear."

"This is so stupid." If he could just have a conversation with her, he said, a real conversation, he could fix all of this. He set down his fork as a wave of pallor crossed his face. Bella reached across the table and lay the back of her hand on his forehead.

"You feel really warm."

"Stomach cramp. I'm okay."

"I think you have a fever."

"Caffeine." He chugged the soda. "Just need to wake up a little."

Bella stirred her macaroni listlessly. She felt kind of tired, too.

They finished lunch and washed up. Mrs. Newton asked them to make a display inside the red Pemberley tent, so Bella arranged a couple of folding chairs next to a small collapsible table in the main chamber while Mike assembled a propane stove. Bella added cups, bowls, and a few envelopes of dehydrated meals. One of them claimed to make red velvet cake. She remembered Jacob joking that this was what people ate on Valentine's Day. Newton's carried a very slim collection of greeting cards at the front counter. She trotted up there and found one for Valentines's Day, fifty percent off, with shiny pink and red foil hearts, and she set it up on the little table next to a field guide to wildflowers.

"Pretty," said Mike. He tossed in a package of trail mix with chocolate chips and dried raspberries.

"Awww..." said Bella. "Let's get a candle."

So they found a citronella insect-repellant candle and put that on the table, too.

"This display is way better than those snowboard snowmen a couple weeks ago."

They laughed about it as they dragged two sleeping bags into the tent, his and hers, and arranged them side by side.

"So..." said Mike, kneeling over then men's bag, unzipping it, "what happened with... you know. Friday night. After the movies."

Bella blushed. She'd managed to find another turtleneck sweater to wear this morning, and now she pulled down the neck, just a bit.

"Nice." He smirked. Then he sat back on his heels as his face went pale, and Bella put her hand on his forehead again.

"You're still sick," said Bella. "What are you doing here?"

"Getting paid."

"Come on. You should be at home, sleeping."

He shrugged. They went out to the shoe section to straighten up the shelves, but after only a few minutes, he sank onto one of the benches.

"You are seriously sick," insisted Bella. "Your forehead's too hot. You look like you're going to pass out. I'm going to get your mom."

"No. She'll clock me out." He glanced at his mother at the front counter. "And I'm not hot; I actually feel kind of cold."

"Fever chills, dummy. That's really bad."

He stretched out his arm. His hand shook. Suddenly he looked like he wanted to cry. "I think I'm still sick."

She got up to call his mother, but he tugged on her arm, saying that really, he just needed a moment to rest. Maybe lie down somewhere. She helped him walk to the tent. "This is a good idea," he sighed as she zipped him into the men's sleeping bag.

"Hide in here. Go to sleep, whatever. I'll cover for you." She left the tent with a sense of purpose. How many times had Mike covered for her when she was late, clumsy, or just plain unresponsive during her zombie days? Now she could do something for him. _I'm such a good friend._ She smiled as she returned to the shoe section.

It didn't take long to straighten the shelves. This was good because she felt pretty tired, too, all of a sudden. She sat on the floor and pretended to arrange socks on a bottom shelf.

A young man came in looking for hiking boots. He wore khaki pants, a short-sleeved white shirt, and a name tag with the Ace Hardware store's red logo. Ace was in the same shopping center as the Outfitters, on the other side of the Thriftway. She'd been in there once or twice to get lightbulbs for Charlie. His red polyester work apron was jammed into one of his back pockets, most of it hanging out, with the strings trailing down his pant leg. He turned a boot over in his hands, looking at the treads.

"Can I try this in a ten and a half?"

In the stock room, Bella leaned against a cabinet for a moment. Then she pulled boxes for size ten, ten and a half, and eleven. She also grabbed the same sizes in a similar boot style and swayed through the green curtain back to the sales floor. The boxes were heavy, and naturally a couple slipped out of her hands. He helped her pick them up. He was good looking, she thought, with thick blond hair curling under the back of his green ball cap. There was an O on it for the University of Oregon, but what she most noticed when he looked up was his name tag.

"Your name is Beers?" she blurted.

He rolled his eyes. "It's B-I-E-R-S, but my stupid boss spelled it wrong. He thinks he's funny."

"Bosses suck." She blurted that, too, and then, wondering if Mrs. Newton could hear her, she added, "Except for mine. Mine's awesome."

He lifted an eyebrow.

"She is."

Bella laced a pair boots for him and knelt on the floor, lacing the others, as he walked up and down a concrete boulder Mr. Newton had made. It looked strange in the store, but it was good for testing the way the boots felt going uphill and down. After trying a few pairs, he sat on the bench next to her and pulled out the laces on one.

"Too much pressure on the tops of my feet," he explained. "Sometimes you can re-lace them like this."

He knew a lot about hiking boots. Bella was impressed. He showed her how to rearrange the laces to ease pressure or make more support for the ankles. His fingers were strong and quick, slipping the laces through grommets. You should work here instead, she joked, but he said no, the hardware store was good for him. He could pick up hours whenever he felt like coming home for a weekend. It was a really long drive, but he was hoping to do his student teaching at Forks High, and since he didn't have any classes this semester on Fridays or Mondays, he came home often to work with one of his former teachers.

"I think I'm going to teach history," he said, double knotting his boots. "You know Mrs. Kranz?"

"She's my teacher."

"Mine, too. At least, she was a few years ago."

"No way."

He held out his hand. "My name's Riley."

Forks High class of 2003, he said. Next fall he hoped to be Mrs. Kranz's student teacher. In the meantime, he came home to have brunch with her sometimes and to go hiking and camping with his family.

"Hiking?" she said. "You heard about the park closure, right?"

"Yeah. Some hikers got killed by a bear. Terrible. But it's just the Hoh Trail that's closed. I can hike somewhere else."

Bella kept her head down, replacing the boots he'd chosen in their box. "You shouldn't hike anywhere," she mumbled.

At the cash register, she passed the scanner over the barcode on the box. _Boop,_ said the machine. _God, this is horrible,_ she thought. _I work at a store that practically urges people to go into the woods. I should picket this place in the parking lot._ She looked at the hairs on his arm, fine and golden, as he opened his wallet.

"You shouldn't hike anywhere," she said again. Mrs. Newton was outside sweeping the sidewalk, so she added, "My dad's the police chief. Something bad is out there."

"Like what?"

She bit her lip. If it were Angela buying hiking boots, wouldn't she be more frank? If it were Angela, she'd run out into the parking lot after her, begging her to reconsider. She'd knock Angela to the ground and sit on her. But what could she say to this guy? She took his credit card and slid it through the card reader, thinking of Charlie's map and the paw prints. The killer was a vampire, right? She was almost sure of it. But why was Charlie finding giant paw prints? What about the huge gray bear those hippies had seen in the Queets Valley?

Were there _two_ kinds of danger out there?

The register printed the receipt on a curled slip of white paper. Bella held it out to him along with his card, but when he took it in his fingers, she didn't let go. She stared at the paper, so small and flimsy, and she felt her cheeks flush.

"You should be careful. You know. Until this thing goes away."

"Thing?"

"The bear."

He tugged very gently on the receipt. He started to say something about how bears usually avoid people, but then he stopped himself with a surprised, "Oh!"

She looked up.

"Ohhh…," he said. His smile was a little lopsided, and his eyes, a warm brown, flickered to hers and then away. "Sorry. I didn't get it. Can we start over?"

"Huh?"

Still holding the receipt, he tapped her hand with his forefinger. "You're sweet. Please tell me you're graduating this spring."

"Uh, yes?"

"Okay. Good. I'm, uh, just down the sidewalk, really. Ace closes at six tonight. You like milkshakes? Or anything. Dinner?"

"Milkshakes?"

"God, I suck at this." His face was as pink as hers now. "What's your name?"

"Bella."

"Bella. Nice. So, Bella, I could come back at six. If you want." He replaced his card in his wallet and picked up the box of boots, holding it against his side under his arm.

He was tall and slim, and he hadn't shaved that day, and she caught herself staring at the soft brown stubble on his jaw. She liked the way he'd curved the brim of his hat and the worn places on the visor that made it seem like it must be his favorite, that he wore it every day. His hair, she saw now, wasn't blond exactly, not like Mike's family's hair; it was more of a honey brown color, with gold curls at the ends of the strands, the parts that had grown the longest, the parts that must have been there since last summer, soaking up half a year's worth of precious, rare sunshine to turn so light. And he was asking her out.

Her eyes widened in surprise, then pleasure. A beautiful, friendly, only slightly dorky college student was asking her to have dinner with him.

This had never happened before. Had Edward ever asked her on a date? Not exactly. He'd asked her to walk with him to a meadow while he wrestled with himself about maybe eating her, and he'd asked her to meet his family while they wrestled with each other about whether she was worth trusting. Had Jacob asked her out? Sort of. He'd asked her out for pizza on his birthday, but she'd had to shoot him down. Then she'd asked _him_ out for pizza, but she pretty much ruined their evening. After that was that wonderful evening in the meadow with the stars, but Jacob made sure she understood that it was NOT a date. That was his way of making her feel comfortable, she realized now, but she guessed that couldn't really count for a date when you put it that way. Then they'd gone to the movies, but it was with a group of friends. And of course, they'd made out in a ditch by the highway.

"Oh!" she said. "I can't. I'm sorry."

Riley looked confused.

"I'm so sorry. You're great. But I— I guess I— Oh, my gosh, I kind of have a boyfriend." And then _that_ thought, on top of everything else, made her blush so much more that she had to cup her hands over her face and stare at him above her fingers.

"You don't sound too sure."

"Well, I've only had him for like, a day and a half."

 _My boyfriend... Is Jacob my boyfriend now? Does kissing equal a boyfriend?_ She had to breathe through her cupped fingers, and then she wanted to laugh, but she thought it would be horribly rude.

"But you were totally flirting with me!" he said.

"I'm sorry. I can't flirt."

"Fooled me!" His cheeks were still pink, but he wasn't angry. He looked like he wanted to laugh, too. "A day and a half! I miss you by a day and a half."

She took her hands away from her face and shook them as if to shake away the nervous, giggly feeling.

He sighed dramatically. "Cupid hates me."

At that she did laugh. They ended up standing at the register for another fifteen minutes, talking about Mrs. Kranz, of all things, and the history scholarship she wanted Bella to apply for. You should apply, he said. Mrs. Kranz had helped him find a scholarship, too, when he graduated, and she'd steered him toward secondary education.

"Why do you want to be a teacher?" said Bella. "Ew."

"It's a good job," he retorted. "You can work almost anywhere. Summers off. Reading about stuff you love, every day. Fun with kids. Summers off."

"You already said that."

Well, he said, it was a good perk. And you feel like you're doing something important. Like Mrs. Kranz. He said she was one of the best teachers he'd ever had, even compared to some of his college professors. Really? she said. It was hard to think of her history teacher as at all remarkable. She's very nice, Bella thought, and helpful, but Riley insisted that she was definitely above average. She took the time to encourage him.

"Sounds like you're her new pet. I'm kind of jealous."

"No. Not a pet. That's weird."

"Teacher's pet."

"Okay, now _you're_ flirting."

When they finally said goodbye, she was pretty sure she'd made a new friend.

"Don't go hiking," she said as he left. "Seriously."

"You sound like my mom. I gotta get back to work. Gotta ask my boss for a new name tag."

She waved as he crossed in front of the store window. He walked past Mrs. Newton, nodding hello, and down the sidewalk, turning for a final glance at Bella. The red strings of his apron swirled around his knees. _No hiking_ , she mouthed, with a stern expression. He smirked and leaned backward, almost cartoonishly, keeping her in sight until his feet carried him beyond the window.

 _Oh. My. Gosh._

So much!

She had to fan her cheeks. If only she had her journal! She would have made a list:

A) Me, boring Bella Swan, hit on by gorgeous college student.

B) I have a boyfriend!

C) I am so dizzy. Is this lust? What does lust feel like? My head is so woozy and I feel really warm. Too warm?

She went to the restroom and looked at herself in the mirror. Just one month ago, she'd been crying on the floor in this room, doing her best to keep her grief silent, and when she'd looked in the mirror she'd seen a ghastly pale, scrawny girl who took comfort in achieving an un-deadly pallor. Now she looked healthier, rosier. She stood up straighter. And a guy she'd just met thought she was "sweet" and attractive. Attractive personally, as in someone to talk to. And attractive, she had to assume, physically. Definitely someone look at across a table and to share a milkshake with. _I look kind of... good._ She grinned at herself with the same goofy grin she'd had on Saturday morning. When Jacob looked at her, is this what he saw?

 _He sees my heart._

The thought made her tear up. Yes, he saw her heart and how it could begin to mend. But also, she thought, smiling at herself, he sees this, too. Maybe he's been seeing this for a long time.

She stuck her chin out like a chicken and did a little dance. But it made her head feel woozy again. She slid down the wall and rested her face on her knees.

 _Why do my jeans feel hot? Why is everything so hot?_

* * *

"Where's Michael?" said Mrs. Newton when she returned to the sales floor.

"Oh. He's, uh, in the bathroom."

"Weren't _you_ just in the bathroom?"

"Yes. He went in when I came out."

Mrs Newton shrugged and walked to the register. "Check on the tent, okay?" she called over her shoulder. "It looks like one of the poles came loose."

 _The tent. Oh, no!_

Bella hurried to the camping section. The tent's left side was partly collapsed, the top part sagging and the bottom part stretched too far by some weighty thing inside. She unzipped the door and crawled to Mike. Still in the sleeping bag, he had rolled against the side of the tent.

"Wake up!" she hissed. "Mike?"

It was nearly four o'clock, and he'd been in there since shortly after lunch. He was perspiring and shivering, and the air in the tent was hot and muggy. She unzipped some windows.

"Are you okay? Can you hear me?"

"Grandma?"

"Wake up."

Risking the tent's entire collapse, she crawled over Mike and squeezed between his sleeping bag and the fabric wall. The whole tent swayed as she pushed on his torso through the bag. She felt so tired all of a sudden that she could hardly summon the energy, but luckily, the slick fabric allowed her to slide him toward the middle of the tent. She knelt behind him and brushed the sweaty strands of hair from his forehead.

"I'm getting your mom."

"I'm fine. Just lying down on the job." He tried to laugh, but coughed weakly. "Bella?"

"Yes, it's me, Bella. You're burning up." She unzipped the sleeping bag halfway.

"Cold!" he whimpered, squeezing his eyes shut and curling into a ball.

Bella put a hand on his back. His white Newton's Outfitters polo shirt was soaked through with perspiration. Even his jeans were damp. His lips were red and his skin was pale. Unzipping the bag completely, she peeled his sweaty socks off and fanned his white, clammy feet. He wouldn't get up, though, no matter how much she urged him to. He kept reaching for the sleeping bag, complaining of the cold.

"It's because you're covered in dampness. Dude, you have the flu. You need to go home. Get some dry pajamas."

The best she could manage was to make him take off the shirt before she gave back the sleeping bag. He got the shirt peeled halfway off before he lost his will and lay down again with it wrapped around his arms and face. Bella looked at his pale stomach, moving softly with his exhausted breaths, and a few wispy hairs on his chest.

She sure was getting a lot of male interaction lately. Getting hit on by a customer. _A super cute customer._ Making out with Jacob on the porch. _Shrine of Porch, sacred now forever._ And even seeing a boy entirely naked, though it was that freak Paul, and it was mercifully too dark to see much. Also, the terror of that night in the meadow completely erased any interest in getting a better peek. But now here she was, in a sweaty tent with an eyeful of half-conscious boy.

This was not sexy.

"Mike?"

Under the fabric stretched across his face, he began to cry softly. It deflated her. She tugged his shirt off and flopped onto her back beside him, groaning, "Fine. Don't get up. I feel bad, too."

"You do?"

"Feel my forehead." She rolled over enough to mash her head against his stomach.

"Super hot," he groaned. "Get off."

"But I have chills."

"Sleeping bag."

It seemed like a good idea to crawl into the ladies' bag. Mike curled up again in the other one.

"I don't want to be sick," she said, tearing up, shivering now. "I hate being sick."

"Take a nap. I'll cover for you."

"Your mom will fire us."

"Fuck it."

* * *

Clenching all her muscles, she shivered and shivered, curled up tight, leaking tears onto the fluffy sleeping bag. _This is a really nice bag_. _I'm wrecking it._ _I'm a horrible person!_ It was a beautiful violet color, with blue stripes down the side with the zipper. It was nicer than her bed at home, nicer even than any hotel she'd stayed in. There was a hood with a drawstring and a large pocket where campers could insert a folded shirt to make a pillow. She looked at Mike's white polo, a sopping, sweaty heap. Disgusting. Trembling with fever, she took off her sweater and placed it in the pocket. It wasn't as if anyone could see her. Then she curled up tightly again with her hands between her knees. Her stomach was beginning to hurt. _Please don't let me throw up._ Her head hurt, too, but it was better if she closed her eyes.

Dimly she was aware, a short time later, of Mrs. Newton's voice, greeting someone at the door. "Feel free to look around."

 _Crap, a customer._

She must have fallen asleep. Now she tried to sit up. Her hair was stuck to her face and a rivulet of sweat trickled down her breastbone and dampened her white bra. She sniffed her armpit and lay down again.

"Mike? I feel so bad. Can you check on the customer?"

He made no reply, so Bella, keeping the sleeping bag tucked up to her chin for modesty, tried again to sit up. He looked even worse, still curled and shivering. _Poor Mike._ Her eyes began to water, just looking at him. She rolled over and scooted behind him in her sleeping bag so they could keep each other warm. _We must look like caterpillars,_ she thought. _Two puffy, sweaty, puke-y caterpillars._ The thought of herself as a miserable bug made her tears spill down her cheeks.

She heard footsteps outside the tent. Maybe if she closed her eyes again, the customer would go away. Instead she heard the zipper on the tent's door. She looked up. It was Jessica Stanley on her knees, one hand pushing aside the red fabric and its mosquito netting. Bella rolled over onto her face and put her hands over her ears, partly muting Jessica's voice, high-pitched and insistent, indignant. These were the words that made it through her fingers and into Bella's stuffy, spinning, sea-sick head: _Mike. Thought so. What is this? Lied to me. Bella skank._

Fever had burned away everything in her brain, including her inhibition. "Shut up," she groaned.

More of Jessica's anger leaked through her hands: _So hurt, Mike. Romantic trail mix? This is what you do at work? Camping candle sneaky tent cheater._

"Mosquito candle!" said Bella. She struggled to sit up. She knocked the candle off the table and tried to lob it at Jessica, but it just rolled into Mike's chin. When he sat up suddenly, Jessica gasped.

Bella managed to open one eye. Mike was shirtless, rubbing his hands over his face to smear away the sweat, and Bella's sleeping bag had fallen away to reveal her own nakedness, except for her plain white bra.

"This is not what it looks like," she said.

"Then what's on your neck?" said Jessica.

"Souvenirs," said Bella flatly. "I got them on Friday after the movies."

"Shut _up,_ " groaned Mike. "Hurting my head." He wrapped the sleeping bag around himself and lay down again. Jessica, her face pink and her eyes full of tears, threw the trail mix package at his head. It bounced off with a crinkly sound and he retreated by rolling onto his knees and heaping the puffy sleeping bag over his head. She threw the Valentine's Day card at him, and the backpacking food envelopes, and even the candle.

"Ow!"

Bella began to cry, too. "Leave him alone!" She flopped over Mike like a half-dead snake over a boulder. "He's sick!" Pulling her sleeping bag over her own head again, she slid down Mike's side, curling up, clutching her head. "You're so mean," she cried. "You're a mean, bitchy cow!"

"Bitchy cow," groaned Mike.

"Bitchy, mean cow!" Bella thrust one arm out of the bag, swiping it over the floor until she found the leg of the folding table. It collapsed with one tug, sending the camping stove and its tiny propane tank at Jessica's knees. When Jessica stood up, her shoulders caught the flap of the tent's door and tugged a pole loose. The red fabric began to slide up the other poles as they splayed out, their black legs stretching over the floor like a giant, squished spider.

"Go _away,_ " groaned Mike.

Still in her sleeping bag, Bella inched over the floor to a window and pressed her face to the netting.

The red fabric settled over the shivering lump that was Mike.

Bella managed to crawl forward enough that the window folded in half as the tent fell, one half over her face. By squirming more, she dragged the whole tent a little farther, getting her window netting off the blue tarp and onto the poured concrete floor. She pressed her face to the soothing coolness. Behind her, the tent rustled and flapped. Hands pressed on her sleeping bag until they found her ankles, and then she was dragged backward. She kicked her feet free and rolled, twisting herself tightly into the swirling fabric.

"You'll never find me!" she screeched. "Bitchy cow!"

Wriggling out of the cumbersome bag, she got her arms free and crawled into one of the side chambers. She managed to find a zipper and tugged it along its track— _zip!—_ just as Jessica caught up with her. There were zippers on each side of the partition. Bella struggled to hold hers in place. More rustling told her that Mike was getting up.

Wearing just his jeans, he crawled over Jessica and pressed her beneath him. He kissed her face and neck until she opened her mouth, and then he kissed her again, deeply. She melted against his chest as he slid a knee between her legs and she melted there, too. Murmured his name.

"Apologize," he whispered, and she went stiff. After a moment, she rolled her eyes and said to Bella that she was sorry. The way she put it was, "Sorry."

"A little more," said Mike.

Another pause. Then Bella listened while Jessica added some reluctant embellishment.

"Really?" frowned Bella. She was still holding the zipper.

Mike kissed Jessica until little tears trembled from the corners of her eyes and slid down her temples into her hair. "Yes, really," she said. "I'm sorry."

"I don't want your boyfriend," Bella whispered.

"Hickies?"

"Someone else."

More kissing. Then Mike sat up, found the main door of the tent, and pulled it over his and Jessica's heads: fresh, cool air. She asked him to come home with her.

"No. Go apologize."

She looked confused.

"To Angela," said Mike. He dug his sweaty shirt out of the tent, put it on, and went to tell his mother that he and Bella were clocking out.

* * *

The Newtons drove her home. She rode in the Suburban with Mike and his mom while Mr. Newton followed in her old truck. It was nice of them to think of that. She thanked them as they dropped her off, then she wearily climbed the porch steps.

It was Sunday night. Normally at this time of the week — _Normally? When was the last time anything in my life was normal?—_ she would have been gathering her homework, getting ready for Monday morning. Maybe doing a little laundry. Now she put her hand on the doorknob and just stood there, swaying on her feet.

Her essay for Mrs. Kranz was still due. What on earth was she going to say? _My horrible vampire ex-boyfriend broke the heart of another girl in nineteen thirty-six? Oh, and he killed her brother._ More importantly, what was she going to say to Charlie? He wasn't going to forget about this.

Then there was Billy. He had rescued her from...something...on Friday. She still wasn't sure what happened. She'd passed out in Mr. Horowitz's room at Olympic Acres on Thursday and Angela had taken her home. She knew that. And she'd spent the next twenty-four hours mostly incoherent, inconsolable, or unconscious. The unconsciousness was troubling. Was it normal to pass out from shock? And why had she been out for so long? There was something about her room that wasn't right. Billy had said so. _Something is wrong in your house,_ he said. And what had Billy said to Charlie that night? All she could remember was that she'd spent a lot of that time on the floor, and that it had been so very hard to get up.

"Get the fuck in the house, Bella, and shut the door."

Charlie didn't usually talk like that. It made her pulse skip as she hurried inside.

The house was quiet. In the living room, the television was tuned to a basketball game, but the sound was off. Players ran across the court, fans waving their arms in the stands, in a silent rush of energy and emotion. Except for a glow coming around the corner from the kitchen, there were no other lights on, which made the light of the television more insistent, almost desperate. Bella hung up her coat in the front closet and drifted into the kitchen.

Dinner was on the table. Leftover tacos. Charlie had his map out again.

"Sit," he commanded.

She sank into her chair. Her head hurt, and she was pretty sure she still had a fever.

"I've had a busy day," said Charlie. "You know how I like to work on Sundays." He spooned ground beef into two taco shells for her, sprinkled cheese and tomatoes on top, and slid her plate across the map. She made sure to keep them, as he had ordered yesterday, off Hoquiam. "Yes, indeedy," he continued. "A very busy day. I've been to the morgue. Trying to reassemble that poor man from Cincinnati. Would you like to know what I found out?"

"No."

"He was not attacked by an animal. Paw prints all around the body, but no serrations in the muscle. No puncture wounds, like from a tooth. No lacerations on the bones. No animals gnawed on him. You see what I'm getting at?"

She tried to change the subject. "Wouldn't you like to eat your tacos?"

Charlie pushed his plate aside. "I have never in my life seen anything so painfully, gut-wrenchingly sickening. I'm not going to be able to sleep. This man— His eyes. Popped. Like grapes. One of them flattened, all the liquid inside gone, and one just dropped in the dirt. His liver: gray, dry. Stomach, intestines: intact. His heart: crushed to pulp."

A trembling tear spilled down her face. "Why are you telling me this? I don't want to know." She pushed her own plate aside. This was so much worse than she thought. Surely a vampire, but not an ordinary one. A savage. "I don't want to know this!"

"But you already do!" said her father. "I need you to help me."

He uncapped the red marker, pointing to the paw prints he'd drawn on the map yesterday. Five of them. Two for the hikers, one for Waylon, one for the gray bear the campers had seen, and one for the huge, strange animal his deputy shot at. "Look at this" said Charlie. He swept his hand in an arc, making a hasty dotted line to connect the prints. "They're all in a line. Like a semi-circle, curving around Forks. And look at this."

He opened a manila folder. It was marked "classified." Removing several photos, he spread them on the table in front of her. At first she wasn't sure what she was seeing. Just images of earth and moss. But as she looked closer, she could see the impression of an animal: footpad, toes, and even, in one example from a mudbank, the pierce-marks of claws in front of the toes. Each print was photographed with a ruler next to it. They spanned about twelve inches.

"What is this?" she cried.

"This was damned hard to collect, that's what it is. My new deputies are awful clumsy with these prints, stepping in them, disturbing the plants, brushing pine needles over them with their boots. I can't photograph these things when they're around. And when I come back to the scene later, they're all gone."

She did not know what he was getting at. Wasn't the killer a vampire? What kind of animal made prints like these? An animal that did _not_ chew on the corpse?

"There's one more," he said again, pulling from his folder a final photograph. It was almost pure white. It took her a moment to realize that it was snow. And another enormous paw print with a central pad, four toes, and the impressions of four sharp claws.

She didn't understand.

"Found this at the back of the yard," said her father. "The morning of Jake's birthday. You woke up early, you were yelling, and when I came in your room you acted like everything was fine. But when I went out back, I found these."

"You photographed them?"

"Damn straight I did. Something's going on around here. I sound like a paranoid lunatic if I talk about this at work. But here's what I know. Three people have died in what we think are animal attacks. An animal isn't eating these people. But there _is_ some kind of animal out there, something abnormally large and dangerous." He made another red paw print at the edge of Forks. It was, she finally understood, in her backyard.

"What did you see, honey? That morning at your window?"

 _Paul._

The memory came back to her, Paul standing in the snow, taking her windowsill from the brush pile. _I saw Paul._ He hadn't been wearing a shirt. Maybe he hadn't been wearing _any_ clothes; the brush pile rose to his waist. Was it twice now that she'd seen him running through the woods naked? _I saw Paul..._

"And what," said Charlie, "or who, could be killing these people if it isn't an animal? 'Stay out of the woods, stay out of the woods.' For weeks, I've been saying that to other people, and now they're saying it to me. Sam. Billy. You." He capped the marker and held onto her hands across the table. "Honey, what _IS_ it?"

Her heart hurt so much. If only she could ease the pain of living with this horrible secret. But there was nothing she could do but frighten him. There was no way, no way to protect oneself against a vampire like this. She tried to pull her hands away to wipe them over her cheeks, but he wouldn't let go.

"I can't tell you," she wept.

"You _can._ "

"You'll never believe me. You'll think I'm crazy." She cried more as a fresh possibility of pain presented itself to her. "You'll send me away. Please don't send me away."

"No. I'll believe you. Just try. Try me."

"I—" She closed her eyes. Maybe— There was, she remembered, one other keeper of this secret. "Billy," she said. "Did he— Did he tell you anything?"

"Billy." Charlie swore and tossed her hands away. He got up and stuffed his photos back into the folder, rolled up his map angrily. "It all comes back to Billy. Like people gotta ask Billy permission to take a piss. And no, Bella, Billy is _not_ talking. Friday night, when you were so sick, he gave me a bunch of crap about tribal business. My own daughter."

Bella put her head on the table.

"The two people I care about most in this world, my child and my oldest friend, are keeping something from me, something that might save somebody's life one day. Where is your loyalty?" He tossed his magic markers into a kitchen drawer and slapped it shut. "Your sense of common decency? You want to see another person die?"  
"No!" she cried. "But it won't do any good!"

"You need to talk!" He pounded a fist against a cupboard; it made the dishes inside rattle and Bella cringe. She put her hands over her ears and got up, but she couldn't make it past the doorway without feeling lightheaded. Shivering, trembling, she leaned on the wall.

It made the fight go out of Charlie. Sit down, he told her, more gently. She skipped the chair and slid to the linoleum. When Charlie stuck a thermometer in her mouth, it came out reading one hundred and three.

"Oh, sweetie, I'm sorry. Let's get you to bed."

He gave her some Tylenol and helped her up the stairs. After she'd changed into her pajamas, he came back with a glass of water, some saltines on a little plate, and a banana. "Try to eat a little. Or just sleep. It's okay."

She lay on her side, staring out the window at the sun going down over the forest.

* * *

 **Thank you for reading.**

 _Questions, if you like. You pick. You guys have given me so many good ideas from your responses, and here we are with a new story and new plot possibilities!_

1\. What do you think of Charlie's progress with the investigation? Do you think Bella should tell him about vampires?

2\. I've been waiting for two years to write my take on Twilight's love-triangle "tent scene." What do you think about that? How about Mike and Jessica's relationship now?

3\. Your thoughts on Riley's character? Should he appear in the story again?

4\. Your thoughts on Bella's feelings about Jacob after last night? Does kissing equal a boyfriend, as Bella wonders? Is he her "boyfriend" now? What's changed? What hasn't? My goodness, what HASN'T changed, indeed?

5\. What do you think about Charlie's reaction to Bella's, uh, indecorous appearance on the morning after her date with Jacob? And what do you think about his reaction to the "daughter dating" thing?

6\. Favorite parts? Funny parts?

 _No pressure, of course, to answer all that. I'd just like to hear what you think, on any topic that catches your_ _interest._

 **Hello again! Please review. I'll send you a preview. Oh, and please log in when you review so I can write back to you. Thank you!**

 **Are there readers of _Bella's Guitar_ who are here for the sequel? I hope you'll say hello. Readers new and old, I hope to hear from you.**


	2. Chapter 2 Eye of the Hurricane

**Chapter Two**

 **"** **Eye of the Hurricane"**

Monday morning found Bella in the bathroom, kneeling over the toilet, shivering with fever. She had vomited twice during the night, and now she felt so bad that leaving the bathroom seemed futile. She hadn't been able to keep anything down, not crackers, or a banana, or applesauce, or any other mild food Charlie offered. She couldn't even keep down a glass of water, which meant that she couldn't keep down any medicine. Charlie stood beside her as she threw up again. He patted her shoulder tentatively.

"I'm sorry you're sick."

"It's okay," she groaned. She rinsed her mouth with a cup of water, spat it out, and curled up on the fluffy green rug beside the bathtub.

"Can I get you anything?"

"Two towels."

When he came back from the linen closet, she placed one towel under her head and the other over her body. It wasn't big enough for a blanket, which made her shiver more and cry.

"For Pete's sake, you can't lie here on the floor."

"Watch me."

Her father stood there for a moment, during which she supposed he was watching her. She didn't feel like opening her eyes to be sure. Then he brought her a better blanket, and with apologies, he went to work.

She dozed on the floor for most of the day, sitting up now and then only to be sick in the toilet. She lay her sweaty head on the porcelain, and the cool, stone-like surface made her head swim with an unwanted remembered sensation and an emotion as vile as the nausea. As the hours went by, she felt that she would never again think of a cold, white, shiny, stoney thing without certain associations.

 _I hate you, Edward._

Late in the afternoon, her head cleared a little. She could think again, but only for a moment before the void was filled with something new: anxiety over her scholarship application and her essay for Mrs. Kranz. She crawled across the hall. Very slowly.

 _I must look like a sloth,_ she thought, coughing. _Sloth rhymes with cough._ She tried to laugh but only coughed more.

In her room, she crept to her backpack on the floor beneath her desk. She found a pen and the yellow notebook she'd written in at Olympic Acres. _Who, what, when, where, why,_ she could remember Mr. Horowitz saying. _And how._ Tugging the notebook from her backpack was exhausting. She looked over her shoulder, through her bedroom door to the bathroom and the green rug. Then she looked at her bed. Soft and fluffy. But another twinge of nausea burbled inside her, so, creeping very carefully _around_ the center of her bedroom, she snagged a pillow from the bed.

So many questions. Who, what, when, etc. And WTF. WTF was making her feel so sick when she stood in the middle of her room? Why had it been so hard for her to get _up_ from that spot when she was first stunned with the truth about Edward?

 _Something is wrong in your house,_ Billy had said.

She eyed the center of the floor mistrustfully. Her shoulder rubbed the wall as she crept around it toward the door. She had a headache. She imagined crawling around and around her room for weeks, rubbing a line on the wall like the narrator in "The Yellow Wallpaper." Trying to let out the one who was trapped by those yellow tendrils.

Into the hall she crept, sliding her pillow and notebook ahead of her. In the bathroom, she lay on the rug again, opened her notebook, and turned the pages. The notes she had taken in Mr. Horowitz's room were a mess. Choppy, incomplete. Incomprehensible. And in places, just plain illegible.

 _I am so fu— ... fundamentally misfortunate._

Turning to a blank page, she tried to draft a few sentences.

 _After the Great Depression, Vera Moss began a long-lasting and fulfilling career as a... book repair lady?_

 _Having learned to economize, Vera Moss shared a home with a friend rather than live independently. Frugality was considered a virtue. That's why she didn't live on her own. Because she was... destroyed?_

Bella began to cry. She pulled her blanket over her shoulders, tucking her chin to her chest. _It could have been me._ Oh, how she wanted to help Vera now! But how? Was there anything left in life for her to enjoy? _It could have been me._

When Charlie came home from work, he found his daughter still on the bathroom floor, burning with fever and severely dehydrated.

"Oh, honey, have you been here all day?" He helped her sit up. "Drink something. Come on." He held the cup for her, but only a moment after swallowing the water, it came right back up. She leaned on the toilet, shaking, as her body revolted once more.

"Okay, you're empty now for sure. No more lying on the floor." Charlie scooped her up, carried her across the hall, and tucked her into bed. Then he squeezed between her bed and the window and pushed on the bed. "You'd be too cold here right next to the window." He slid the bed right back to the center of the room, where it had been on the day she moved in.

* * *

Tuesday.

Wednesday.

Thursday.

She spent much of that time in bed, her head woozy, her general mood depressed. After the second day, the nausea subsided and she was able to drink water and ginger ale, and to eat applesauce and saltine crackers. Charlie brought these things to her on a little tray each morning, with many apologies.

"I'm sorry, but I've got to go to work. I've called the school to report you absent. Please try to get up some time today. Just come downstairs, honey, and watch a little TV. Move around, okay?"

She said she would try. But each morning after he was gone, she'd pull the covers over her head. She'd doze half the day and spend the other half laboring over her essay, still lying in bed. She wasn't sure anymore if she could complete the thing before the deadline. And what on earth was she going to say?

 _Vampires are real,_ she wrote. It looked horrifying to see the words on paper. _They are real, really shitty ex-boyfriends._

She also wrote, _There are many ways to suck the life out of a person._

This essay was impossible. Maybe she wasn't going to college after all. She'd stuff her notebook under her pillow and cry until she was dehydrated again and her ginger ale was all gone. Between three and four o'clock she'd usually get up and brush her teeth. Rub some cold water on her face. Then she'd creep downstairs, holding onto the railing, and dial Jacob's number, hoping he'd be home from school. But it only rang and rang. She checked Charlie's answering machine, but all she got there was a message from Renee.

"Hi, Bella, it's Mom. Miss you. Phil and I are hoping you're okay. Charlie says you're okay, so I know you're _okay_ , okay, but I wish I could hear it from you. We're okay. Call us, okay?"

She pressed the delete button.

Why hadn't Jacob called? Was something wrong? Was he changing his mind?

 _No. He hasn't changed his mind about this since he was six._

She'd think again about how good it felt to kiss him on the porch, to whisper with him, and to tuck her head under his chin and smell his skin. To nuzzle into his hair. To feel that one tear on his cheek. Then she'd start crying again.

 _I'm happy, right?_

She wasn't sure. Why hadn't he called?

In the refrigerator, she'd find another bottle of ginger ale and some applesauce. With an old, brown, chevron-striped afghan wrapped around her shoulders like a cape, she'd shuffle into the living room and look at the picture of her grandparents on the mantle. Two gray-haired people with their arms around each other, sitting on the steps of a little brick house with daffodils in the garden. How nice it must have been for them to grow old together. Then she'd think about Vera and cry more. By the time Charlie got home, she was back in bed, feeling as if she were sinking into the mattress as her head felt heavier and heavier.

On Thursday evening, he'd had enough of this.

"You stink, Bella." He stood in her doorway. "You have to get up. Get a shower. Come downstairs for dinner; I've got Chinese take-out."

"I don't feel good," she said.

"That's why you need to get up. And my god, what is that flowery smell in here?"

"Huh?"

"It's like perfume. I didn't think you wore perfume. Or maybe it's deodorant. Girly deodorant."

Bella rubbed her hands over her face. Her mouth felt like cotton. She sniffed her armpit. She was most certainly not wearing deodorant. But now that Charlie mentioned it, she did notice a funny smell in her room. She had noticed it once or twice earlier in the week, and she supposed it had been getting stronger.

"Come on," said Charlie. "Get up. Have you been wearing that shirt all week?"

"I don't know."

"You are really hard to raise, you know that? I can't believe I have to remind an eighteen-year-old to change her clothes. This is not like you. Where's my fidgety little girl? The girl who cleans everything I already cleaned?" Frowning, he kicked her dirty clothes on the floor into a pile.

"There's underpants in there!" she groaned. "Don't look at my underpants."

A white thing stuck to Charlie's shoe. He shook it off like it was a snake and turned his energy to her books.

"What's all this stuff on your desk? Is this homework? For god's sake, have you been _doing_ any homework all week? Did you call your teachers? Or a friend?"

"No."

He opened her closet and a pile of shoes tumbled out.

"Quit messing with my stuff," she said. "Go away."

"I'm looking for the perfume. Stinks. Weird stinky shit. What's it called?"

"I don't know."

"What's it called? I don't want to get any of that for Joy. Birthday's coming up. Gotta get a gift, she probably wants something fancy or or shiny or something, I don't know. Shit."

Bella sat up and took a good look at her father. He was still in his crisp, severe, black uniform, but his face looked worn out and his eyes were darting everywhere. His hands shook as he pushed her clothes side to side in her closet, talking to himself. She couldn't hear all of his words, but it was something about the investigation, murders, paw prints, the Clallam County Coroner, the Port Angeles Sheriff, and the ill-timed realization that somehow, some time in the last month or so, he'd gotten himself a girlfriend. She gathered that he hadn't exactly planned on that.

"Well, what did you think?" she said. She flung her covers off—a sour-sweet whiff _did_ kind of billow out when she moved the blankets—and glared at him. "What did you think would happen? I _told_ you—"

"Told me she was a 'scary beast.' Don't think I'm going to forget that. Nice song."

" _You_ gave me the guitar!"

"'Scary beast.' Nice." He pushed her clothes all the way to the left, hangers screeching on the rail as he mashed her sweaters together. Her new pale pink one slipped off and he stepped on it.

"Get out of my stuff!" said Bella. _How had this conversation degenerated so fast?_ "This is my room!"

"My room, my house, my _god_ what is that smell? Cheap-ass drugstore—"

"I don't _have_ any perfume!"

"Cheap, acidic, flowery funk—stinks like—stinks like the women I sometimes arrested, along with their johns, standing on a street corner in Seattle."

"Huh?"

"Whore, Bella. Whatever you got in here smells like a cheap whore."

Her eyes filled with indignant tears. "Nothing in here smells like a— like a lady who dates a lot!"

"Whore. Holy shit. Do you have any shirts that aren't plaid and flannel?"

"Yes. You're standing on one."

He looked at her best sweater, under his boot.

"Go away. I'm sick. You can't be messing up my stuff." She fished a limp-looking pair of white socks out of her bedsheets and tugged them on just as Charlie snagged a blue plaid flannel shirt from its hanger.

"This one's mine," he growled as he left.

When Bella came down to the kitchen a few minutes later, she saw that he'd changed into jeans and the blue shirt. For her part, she'd managed to drag a pair of gray sweatpants onto her prickly, unshaved legs underneath her loose, long-sleeved cotton nightshirt. It hung to her knees. She had to hitch it up as she slumped into a chair at the table. Sighing from all that effort, she lay her face on the cool, formica table, but after only a moment's peace, Charlie commanded her to get up and dish the fried wontons, rice, and moo-shoo pork into serving bowls. She wobbled to the counter, pausing to rest against the refrigerator, and scooped their dinner from white paper boxes beaded with condensation. When she turned around to carry it to the table, she stopped in surprise, then slouched in exhausted resignation: Charlie had his map out again.

As she sat down, she kept her wontons off Hoquiam.

"Animals," said Charlie. He pointed to the paw prints he had drawn with his red magic marker. There were five in a bow-shape in the woods, curving around the east side of Forks, and one in her backyard, right about where an arrow would be if someone drew back the bow to shoot. "Now watch this..." he said, uncapping the red marker.

Bella propped her chin on her hands and tried to keep her eyes open.

"There's one more." He colored another paw print in the northwest corner of the peninsula, at Neah Bay on the Makah reservation. "There," he said, as if he'd pulled a rabbit out of his hat. "What do you think of _that_?"

"You found a paw print?"

"I found a _witness!_ "

She gnawed on a piece of pork, waiting for him to say something more.

"There was another animal attack. Back in August."

"Cold trail, Dad." Even she knew that.

"There was a woman. A young woman. Attacked by a bear. Lots of stitches. Treated at the hospital in Port Angeles." He said his colleague, Sheriff Joe Carrington, had a friend who worked there, and he remembered how everybody was talking about this girl and how terribly she was wounded, clawed on her face and arms.

Something stirred in Bella's memory, but her head was too cloudy to focus on it. "That's awful," she said. "But it was a bear. So what?"

"It was an _animal attack_. Maybe that's not the whole story. And the girl lived. Who is she? Where is she now?" Filing a subpoena to get those medical records could take months, he said. There had to be another way.

Charlie's face was red. His hands were too shaky to be much use with chopsticks, and as he capped his marker and got up for a fork, Bella got up for the thermometer.

"You don't look so good," she said. He stuck the thermometer in his mouth to humor her, but then blinked at it when he came out reading one hundred and one. "See?" said Bella.

"I'm not sick," he declared. "I never get sick."

"And I," she said, coughing, "am the President."

He frowned at her, and she started to wheeze and laugh.

"No, no," she said. "I'm Winston Churchill. Or Cleopatra. No, I'm a cheetah. Look at my fast recovery."

More frowning.

It only made her laugh harder, even though her sides hurt. She carried her plate to the sink and leaned on the counter, gauging the effects of having eaten one piece of pork. Was that a good idea? Too late now. Her laughter changed to a groan. She went into the living room with tiny, tiny steps, sliding her white socks over the hardwood, and curled up on the green sofa with an afghan.

Charlie made a couple of sarcastic "hardy har har" sounds in the kitchen and finished his dinner. "I'm going to blow this open. You'll see. And I'm _not_ taking Sam Uley up to Neah Bay to look into this."

"Sam?"

"Number One Paw Print Fucker-Upper. Everything I see in the woods has his boots all over it."

"You're sick, Dad." To her, his cursing was another sign. "Come watch TV."

He rolled up his map and came into the living room, popping a couple of Tylenol and drinking a glass of water. "He's gonna crack," he said as he picked up the remote control.

"Who?"

"Uley."

Bella sighed. As far as she was concerned, Sam could go jump in a lake. Last time she'd seen him, he was making Embry take Jake night-hiking, and not at all in a let's-make-s'mores kind of way. If Jake hadn't caught the flu at the movies, then surely he'd gotten sick stomping through the woods at night. Sam was probably the reason why Jake hadn't called her. _Or maybe he changed his mind._ She sniffled as the doubts returned. _Maybe I'm too much of a mess for him. Maybe Jake doesn't want a girlfriend._

As soon as the word "girlfriend" crossed her mind, she sat up.

"It's Emily!"

Charlie put down the remote.

"Emily saw the bear! She's Sam's girlfriend!"

Charlie's face went white, then red, then cooly, barely pink.

Bella gathered that Sam had never mentioned this. But when she suggested that her father ask him about it, Charlie surprised her. "Nope," he said. He was, he reminded her, still waiting for Sam to slip up. Sam was hiding something. After the task of collecting the remains of the second hiker, Sam had been shaken, deeply shaken. He was a mess. He would crumble, and soon.

"You're waiting for him to cry?" she coughed. "That's mean."

"No. He's already been crying. We all have. I kick myself for sending him out to do that job. But I'm waiting for him to come here for coffee."

"What? Like here, to the house?"

"Yep. Told him he was welcome any time."

Her father's plan, it seemed, was to be _nice_ to him until he fell apart. She stared at her father, and he leaned back in his easy chair, waving his arms around the living room as if to indicate a carefully spun web, at the center of which he would wait like the world's most sympathetic spider.

* * *

"Make some cookies," Charlie said to her the next morning.

It was Friday. She was lying on the couch under the brown afghan, tentatively slurping at a glass of orange juice. Keeping away the nausea after eating a piece of pork had seemed like a huge accomplishment last night, and now she was branching into new foods. At this rate, she'd be better by summer vacation.

"Make some chocolate chip cookies, like you made before, and I'll tell Sam that there are cookies here at the house."

She stared at him.

"Bait, dummy."

He was dressed for work, finishing a cup of coffee and a bowl of cereal. His skin looked a little too pink and shiny.

"Aren't you sick?" said Bella.

"I am not sick," he said firmly. "I got a lot to do. Make some damn cookies and call me when they're done. And take a shower." With those commands, he put on his coat and headed out the front door.

Bella sat up and slowly drank half the glass of orange juice. Her stomach felt okay. She rubbed her hands over her face and stood up shakily. "'Make some cookies,'" she muttered in a whiny voice. "How about, 'Make some cookies, _please_?'" She summoned the energy to fold the afghan, climbed the stairs, and turned on the water for the shower. While it was heating up, she looked in the mirror.

Her skin seemed yellow and waxy, and her dark eyes were sunk in shadows. It reminded her of the way she had looked after Edward left. She smelled her nightgown, and that same flowery funk she had noticed in her room seemed to have clung to the garment.

Today was the fifth day she'd been absent from school, and she needed to get well or miss her deadline for her history essay. And not just Mrs. Kranz's deadline, but the deadline for her college application. Thoughts of Vera made the sad, hopeless look in her eyes a little darker, and she turned away from the mirror.

The warm shower felt good. Shaving her legs and under her arms felt good, too, and she scrubbed herself all over with a fancy, exfoliating sugar scrub Renee had sent, presumably last Christmas. It smelled like apricots. Much better than whatever was in her room. When she was finished she dressed in fresh clothes, found her history notebook, and turned on her computer.

 _Vera Moss was born in 19_,_ she typed. _Vera Moss was born in 19_ in Hoquiam, Washington to John and Judith Moss, the owners of Moss Mercantile and Hardware, a dry goods store. She had two brothers, one older and one younger..._

This didn't seem very interesting. It was the sort of "just the facts, ma'am" biography that anyone might write. The essay needed to be special.

 _Vera Moss is eighty-six years old. She resides at Olympic Acres, a retirement home in Forks, Washington, where she enjoys the company of her roommate._

Bella wondered if the verb "enjoy" had any application in any facet of Vera's life. She stared at that word, and then she stared at her newer sentences and realized they were just as dull as the first. She struggled to come up with something better as that old flowery smell drifted into her awareness. Could Renee have sent her some crummy perfume that she had forgotten about? She looked in her desk drawers but found only papers from school, pens and pencils, nothing at all remarkable.

The phone rang. Her heart leapt for a moment, hoping it might be Jacob, but when she lifted the receiver she was surprised to speak to Mrs. Kranz. She was calling from the teachers' lounge at lunch time.

"I'm sorry to bother you at home, Bella, but I wanted to make sure you knew that we need to turn in your scholarship application on Monday."

"Monday?" squawked Bella.

"How are you doing? I heard you have the flu."

"Uh, I'm getting better, I guess."

"That's good. Listen, I've gone ahead and written your recommendation letter. I'm going to mail it to Evergreen now."

"Thank you?"

"We need to get your essay in the mail on Monday. You'll have to walk it to the post office to get it postmarked promptly. I've got the other forms you'll need. Have you written your personal statement?"

"Uh, yes?"

There was a pause. Then the teacher said, "Really?" and Bella's eyes swam with anxious tears.

"Don't worry," said Mrs. Kranz. "Go to the website. Hit 'Academics' then 'History Department' then 'Scholarships and Honors.' Next go to 'Admissions' and hit 'Freshman.' You'll find the prompts for the general application essay and the intended history major statement in these spots."

"I'm going to major in history?"

"Yes. If you want to get this scholarship, then yes, you are."

"Oh."

There was another pause. Bella smudged a tear away and grabbed a pencil to write down the instructions about the website, but she couldn't remember them all.

"Bella?" said Mrs. Kranz.

"Yes. I'm here. I'm fine."

"Bella, who is helping you with this?"

It was Bella's turn to pause.

"Can you meet me at three o'clock today? Are you well enough to stop by the school?"

"Yes."

"Good. I'll call your father. This is a group effort. Bella, you are a very special girl, and I'm not going to let you lose this opportunity."

"Okay," she nodded, trying not to sniffle. Thank you."

After she hung up the phone, she fluttered her hands in the air and paced back and forth in the kitchen. The deadline was Monday? She had been thinking for weeks that the deadline was "soon," but she hadn't actually looked it up. And now she needed to write more than one essay? She paced into the living room and walked to the front door, then back to the kitchen, then back to the living room again. She paced faster and faster until she found herself just turning in circles, spinning on the hardwood in her socks, and then she sat down on the floor. It was hard to breathe.

* * *

Charlie put two cans of chicken soup into the shopping cart. Bella added chocolate chips and pecans for the cookies. They also threw in some tea and tissues, and Bella wanted to buy a pink rubbery hot water bottle. "To be my new friend," she said. Charlie nodded. Then they went to the checkout stand and drove home.

Mrs. Kranz had reached Charlie at the station, and he met Bella at school at three o'clock. It felt weird to squeeze through the halls against the traffic of everyone else leaving, and even more awkward to suffer the many surprised or wary glances of students who watched the police chief following her. Before long, a path cleared. She looked back to see Charlie—in his black uniform with his gold badge on his chest, his shoulder radio, and his sidearm in its holster—frowning at everyone.

In the classroom, Charlie wedged himself into a chair with an attached desk and frowned at everything else: the green carpet, the windows, the maps on rollers, and the bulletin boards papered with essays. Bella nudged him. So embarrassing. But Mrs. Kranz saw through his discomfort. "Every parent is confused," she said. "That's normal. And every parent wants to help. That's why we're here."

She had written down the instructions Bella needed to find the essay prompts on the website, and she talked to Charlie about the application for federal student financial aid. He would need his 2005 tax return, she said. Bella's mother would need to send that document, too. "Same for you, miss," she said to Bella. "You have a job, right?" She talked more about various kinds of savings accounts families often had, and the need to calculate the percentage of income that went toward non-negotiables, such as a mortgage. Also, there might be inheritance from grandparents to consider. Families ought to gather this information, she said, and weigh it against the possibilities of student loans, grants, and federally subsidized work-study programs.

Of course, Mrs. Kranz continued, admissions were need-blind. She didn't have to worry about not being admitted if it would be hard to afford tuition. And really, she said, Bella should focus on the basics of the application. Things like transcripts, test scores, the essays, and the online application itself.

"Have you requested your transcript from your high school in Arizona?"

Bella and Charlie had turned to one another with big, slow blinks.

At home, Charlie put away the groceries while Bella opened the folder from Mrs. Kranz and spread everything on the kitchen table. So many forms. Charlie sat beside her with his elbows on the table, sorting papers with one hand and pinching the bridge of his nose with the other. Outside, it started to rain heavily, and the water pattered on the roof and rolled down the window in dozens of tiny streams.

"You just write the essays," he said at last. "I'll fill out the other stuff. And I'll, uh, call Renee."

"Thank you," she whispered.

In her room, she tried to wrap her brain around the essays. There was the original essay, her supposed masterpiece, which amounted, she realized, to a senior thesis: _How has Vera's life been shaped by the Great Depression and its legacy?_ Next was the general freshman application essay: _Write about something that makes you feel proud._ And the history department's scholarship application statement: _Why do you want to major in history, and how is the past relevant in our present lives?_

What?

How on earth was she going to do this?

The only thing she could think of for the freshman essay was baking cakes for Jacob's party. At the time, the attention she had received was agonizing. But Sue and Mrs. Weber said she should feel proud, so she guessed she'd write about that. It was not what other students might write, not like winning a championship game or building a robot or having an internship— _things that smart kids do,_ she thought _—_ but she would try to make the cakes sound interesting.

As for the history essay, she realized she now had to A) decide to major in history, and B) fabricate a reason for this decision, other than potentially getting a scholarship.

She sat down at her computer. When Charlie came upstairs an hour later to say that dinner was ready, he found her staring out the window at the rain.

"I can't concentrate."

He came in and sat on her bed, leaning forward with his forearms across his thighs, his hands clasped together, looking at his boots. In her little garret room, with its low ceilings, her strings of fairy lights on the walls, and her pink, blue, and green patchwork quilts, he seemed out of place. "Bella," he said, "do you believe in ghosts?"

"What?"

Charlie sighed, shaking his head. "I'm going crazy. Can't solve this case. Can't seem to help you cheer up. Your room smells weird. You walk around looking so sad, like you can't get rid of the bad memories, and I thought—just today, I thought this—maybe you, maybe this house... is kind of haunted."

"A ghost?"

"I looked up the property records this morning. No one ever died here. That's good, right?"

"Yes." She wrinkled up her nose. "Why are we talking about this? It's creepy."

"Because I figured out what this room smells like. Ever so faintly. Sometimes I smell it; sometimes it's gone. But I smelled it at the morgue last week, and today I remembered. Formaldehyde."

"Formal what?"

"It's a powerful preservative. Keeps dead things from decomposing."

Like a stone dropped into a well, the idea fell deep, deep, down into Bella's mind, and there it settled in the dark, for her to consider much later. Now though, she rose and cracked open her window a little bit.

"You'll get cold," Charlie said.

"I don't care. I don't feel good. I can't concentrate. Now I can't sleep either; I'm going to think of ghosts."

"Sorry. I don't believe in them anyway. At least, I think I don't. But I'm willing to consider it." Then he said, "hey," softly and tapped his boot against the leg of her chair to make her look at him. "I'm _willing to consider it."_

She didn't know what to say to that. She looked at his dark eyes, sombre and serious. "I just don't understand this case. Or you. There's no explanation for some things, and I'm grasping at straws. Things that don't exist. And I'm still waiting for you to talk. You want me to wait for you to crack, like Sam?"

She dropped her gaze to the floor. "I gotta write these essays."

Charlie unplugged her computer. He wound up all the cords and carried the hard drive and keyboard downstairs. Bella followed with the monitor, Charlie went back for her printer, and then he set everything up for her at the kitchen table.

That night, they had soup for dinner. Charlie was still running a low fever, so he took some more Tylenol. With his help, Bella sketched some ideas for the history major essay. He talked to her about some of the books he was reading. The histories of the Olympic Peninsula tribes were certainly relevant today, weren't they? And didn't she know more than the average eighteen-year-old white girl about life in an isolated, impoverished Indian community? "Try not to make it sound so fun, Dad," she grumbled. But she was encouraged to think she had something to write about. Then she spent an hour trying to make baking sound interesting, and at ten o'clock Charlie made her stop.

She slept on the couch, curled up with the brown afghan and her new hot water bottle, trying not to think about ghosts. _Damn it._

* * *

Angela stopped by on Saturday morning with a care package, which consisted of tissues, chocolate, and Jane Austen movies.

"You're still sick? Poor Bella!"

Bella looked up from her computer at the kitchen table with a bleary, defeated expression. She had showered and dressed in sweatpants, a plaid flannel shirt, fuzzy socks, and a ponytail for her hair, which was still wet and hanging limp and stringy from the top of her head. Angela looked significantly perkier in black leggings, a blue tunic sweater, and her ballet flats. Her long, brown hair was smooth and shiny—and dry—and she said she'd kicked the flu three days ago.

"You look really bad."

"Thanks, Ange."

She slid into a seat opposite Bella. "Hey... I was wondering..."

"I'm going into the office," called Charlie from the living room, "so you can talk about boys."

"Shut _up,_ Dad. Geez."

Angela waited until the front door clicked shut before she threw herself halfway onto the table, her arms stretched out and her face bent to her elbows, groaning, "Quilllllll...!"

Bella rolled her eyes, closed her notebook, and propped her chin on her hands in what she hoped was an "I'm here for you," posture, ready to listen.

Ever since their trip to the movies, Angela had been agonizing about what Quil must think of her. "He was so sweet," she sniffed. "Heroic. I said, 'I think I'm going to throw up,' and he tried to open the door, but it was stuck. Then he took off his jacket and held it out for me, and I was sooooooo sick."

"I'm sorry."

"Then he dropped me and Mike off at our houses, and I was like, 'See you again soon?' and he was like, 'Uh, feel better,' and I was standing there on my porch, thinking, 'How can I save this evening?' but there was no way. Then my mom came out, and Quil was like, 'She's sick,' and my mom was like, 'Oh.' And that's the last time I saw him."

"Wow. Um, that's too bad."

"So then I thought, should I call him and apologize? Or will he call me to see if I'm okay? But he didn't call. I wish I had thought of offering to wash his jacket; then I could see him again."

 _Yeah,_ thought Bella, remembering the magic of Charlie's washing and returning Mrs. Ateara's pants, _that probably would have worked._

"Ange," she said. "Hey. It's okay. Maybe you guys just aren't meant to be. You're so smart. He's really good at belching."

"So? I like him. Why don't you want me to have him?" She looked at Bella with glistening eyes, with the look of a person who wants something even more once she's told she can't have it.

Quickly, Bella tried to back paddle. "It's not that. No, no. It's just... Well..."

"He must hate me."

"No! No, no, no. He's incapable of hatred, I'm pretty sure."

"You think?"

"Yes." Bella scrambled to say something comforting. "He's really easy-going. Has lots of friends. There's nobody who _doesn't_ like him." _Holy crap, am I talking up QUIL?_ "And there's nobody that he doesn't like, except maybe Sam."

"Sam?"

"Just a guy from La Push. Anyway, he's—" _Patient, loyal, and forgiving,_ Charlie had said of his father... "—not the kind of guy to get mad or stay mad. He just doesn't."

Angela smiled a little bit.

"He's probably sitting at home right now, eating Doritos and watching TV. Not thinking about the jacket at all."

"Not thinking about me, either."

"Well, that's probably true, but not because he doesn't like you. He's just..." Suddenly an idea came to her. "You ever train a dog?"

"No."

"He's like a bad dog. Or a stray dog. Or a dog who flunked obedience school. He doesn't know how to call girls. He doesn't know—"

"Anything?" said Angela.

Bella was surprised to see a pink glow of hope spreading over Angela's face.

"You mean, like, _anything?_ Oh, my god, I can train him!"

"What?"

"I can train him! He'll be my perfect boyfriend! I can make him into—"

"Slow down."

But it was too late. Angela had stood up from the table, fluttering her hands in the air, then pressing her fingers to the huge smile that was growing on her face. She grabbed a notepad from the counter and swiped one of Bella's pencils. Bella, horrified, watched her make a list of qualities she wanted in a boyfriend: _Cute. Funny. Calls me. Makes me laugh. Expresses feelings._

Good luck, thought Bella.

 _Plans dates. Hangs out with my family. Good listener. Good kisser._

"Probably yes," said Bella, remembering Rebecca's reaction at the birthday party. One kiss! Maybe Quil had a latent talent. _Ew. I wish I'd never thought that!_ She pictured Rebecca, dropped in the snow, and her expression that was a mixture of surprise, horror, delight, and then horror again, probably for being both married _and_ delighted by a kiss from her second cousin.

Angela added a few more qualities to her list and put checkmarks next to "Cute" and "Funny." Reluctantly, Bella passed her the scrap of paper with the Atearas' number that Charlie had stuck to the fridge, and Angela took a ball point pen, inscribed the number on the inside of her forearm, and pulled her sweater down over the mark.

"Well, I feel a lot better!" she said. "Now let's talk about you. How's Jake?"

Bella looked at the table, tracing one finger in a circle on the yellow cover of her notebook. "He's fine, I guess."

Angela saw right through that, and pretty soon Bella was glumly confessing the doubts she'd had this past week, her inability to reach him on the phone, and her guess that he must have the flu, too, or else he would have called.

"Did you leave a message?"

"They don't have an answering machine."

"Well, how many times did you call?"

"I don't know. Four or five?"

"And did you talk to his dad?"

"He wasn't home, either. No one was home."

"This makes no sense." After what happened on Friday, it was a given that he'd call as soon as possible.

"He must be really sick," said Bella.

"But you were sick, too. And _you_ still managed to crawl to the phone."

The same thought had occurred to Bella, though she didn't want to acknowledge it. "Something is wrong," said Angela. "Call him."

"What, now?"

"Yes, call."

Bella frowned at the table. But Angela pushed her out of her chair and to the phone. Bella felt like an idiot as she dialed the number. Wasn't it obvious that he didn't want to talk to her anymore? _I can't_ she mouthed to Angela, but the phone was already ringing on the other end, and after only a moment, Billy answered.

"Oh!" she said stupidly. "You're there."

Billy's greeting was gruff.

"Can I talk to Jake?"

He can't come to the phone, said Billy, and when Bella asked if he had the flu, Billy hesitated before replying, "No. He's... He won't be able to see you for a while."

"He's not sick?" She looked at Angela with huge, teary eyes, and Angela's face fell.

"He's not doing well. He's—"

Bella wondered if Billy could sense her distress over the phone. She was smudging away a tear when Billy said, "He's got mono."

"Oh." _Mono_ , she mouthed to Angela.

"He'll be out of school for a few weeks. No visitors, okay? It's very contagious."

"Oh. Oh, good. Well, not good, just— Tell him I called?"

"Sure, sure."

The line went dead.

"There," said Angela. "You okay?"

They spent the rest of the morning working on the essays. Angela was a lot of help with the baking essay, pointing out places where Bella could add more description. She felt relieved, around noon, when she realized they'd actually finished it. The essay about majoring in history, however, was looking hideous, with ideas patched together like a scarecrow, and her essay about Vera and the Great Depression was no better off than it was a week ago. Bella opened her yellow notebook to show Angela what she'd written so far. As she was sliding it across the table, it fell open to the page where she had written, _Vampires are real,_ and she quickly snatched it back and turned to a different page.

"You need a thesis," said Angela after looking at her notes.

They worked for an hour, but made no further progress. Bella put her hand over her heart and tried to take deep breaths, but the panicky feeling was returning.

"Take a break," said Angela.

They made the cookies Charlie wanted, and after that, they curled up on the living room couch and watched _Sense and Sensibility._ The wishy-washy-ness of Edward Ferris was irritating ( _Stupid Edward,_ Bella thought), but she liked the costumes and green scenes of the countryside. Angela liked Alan Rickman as Colonel Brandon. They ate a dozen or so of the fresh, hot, gooey cookies with cold glasses of milk.

When the movie was over, Bella got up, returned to the kitchen table, and lay her head on her yellow notebook.

"Come on," said Angela. "You can do it."

"I can't."

"You know what you need? A tutor. Like, somebody who's good at history. Somebody who knows what college professors want to read."

"Like who?"

"Like this guy who goes to my church. I think he's in town this weekend."

* * *

At six o'clock that evening, Bella and Angela stood on the sidewalk outside of Ace Hardware next to the grocery store. A fine, misty drizzle made the air look silvery gray, and tiny beads of water gathered in their hair. Bella shuffled her feet on the wet pavement, hitching her backpack higher on her shoulder. She looked at Newton's Outfitters at the other end of the shopping center.

Mrs. Newton had called shortly after they finished watching the movies. She wanted to see how Bella was feeling, and to assure her that she still had her job, even if she couldn't come in for her shifts this weekend. Luckily, she explained, she had been able to hire a new co-worker to fill in for her.

"Oh. Okay. That's good."

Then Mrs. Newton informed her that she was now the owner of a nearly-new, somewhat sweaty sleeping bag. Just like Mike. The cost, almost two hundred dollars, would be taken out of her paycheck.

"Oh. Okay. Sorry about that."

Now she stood in the drizzle, wondering what she would do with a fancy sleeping bag. And she didn't feel like walking over to Newton's to get it. In the hardware store, the lights were going out. First at the back of the store, then at the front. She could see the manager and one employee, a young man, putting on their jackets. Then the door opened with a jingle of bells overhead, and the warm brown eyes of the young man lit up when he saw her.

"Bella!"

"Riley. Hi."

"Oh, you already know each other," said Angela.

Riley greeted her, too, and rolled his eyes toward Bella. "She was hitting on me last weekend."

"Was not."

Angela looked amused.

" _He_ was hitting on _me,_ " said Bella.

After the girls described the problem with Bella's essay, Riley said he'd be glad to help. But only if he could buy her a milkshake at the diner.

"No milkshakes," said Bella.

"No milkshake, no work."

"Fine. But I'm buying."

Riley looked smugly satisfied with this arrangement. He asked the girls to follow him to his car, an old black Chevy Nova parked outside of Newton's. It was a big car, long and sleek, yet with the odd angles of '70s styling at the rear and the front grille. The windshield seemed huge, but the windows on the sides, especially in the back, were high and narrow. He opened the passenger door and tossed his red Ace Hardware apron onto the seat. Then he took off his jacket, tossed it in there, too, and unbuttoned his white uniform shirt. He wore a white T-shirt under it, but it was thin and tight.

Bella looked away.

"When's the essay due?" he asked.

It would be rude, she thought, not to look at him when talking to him, so she turned her head and said Monday. Then she looked away again, but not before noticing that although he was still super cute, his physique was what old ladies would call _bean pole._

"Monday?" he said. "That's a lot of work to do before Monday. This might involve milkshakes and pizza." He pulled a green U of Oregon long-sleeved T-shirt out of the backseat and tossed it in the air, twirling it on his fingertips like he was making a pizza crust.

Bella squeezed her eyes shut and counted to ten.

"Ooh," said Angela. "How do you do that?"

"Heads up!" He flipped the spinning T-shirt toward Angela. It landed on her face. She laughed and tossed it in the air again, but it just kept flopping down.

The lights went out, one by one, in Newton's Outfitters. The drizzle turned to a gentle rain as the evening got grayer and the lights on posts in the parking lot blinked on. Angela put up her umbrella, and Bella reached into the pocket of her red coat and found the lumpy red hat Angela had made. When the Outfitters' automatic door slid open, two figures stepped out and stopped short on the sidewalk, their breath making tiny white puffs in the cool air: Mike and Mrs. Newton's new hire.

 _I should have known,_ thought Bella.

"What's this?" said Quil.

"Hi," she grumbled.

Riley leaned back against the car and put his arms around Bella's and Angela's shoulders. "He looks kind of pissed and confused," hissed Riley. "Is this your boyfriend?"

"No," she mumbled.

"Oh." He looked at Angela. "Your boyfriend?"

"No," she said, turning pink.

"I'm her boyfriend's best friend," said Quil, frowning. "Who are you, Shirtless Wonder?"

Angela explained about the essay. "They're going over to the diner. Milkshakes and homework. Hey," she said brightly, "you want to come?"

Quil's frown vanished. But then he promptly turned around and invited Mike to come, too.

They turned up the hoods on their rain jackets and trooped across the parking lot, heading uptown along the gravel shoulder of the 101. Passing trucks, though they slowed to twenty-five miles per hour where the highway was essentially Main Street, nevertheless sprayed water at their legs.

"Should have drove," said Mike after a few blocks.

"Wuss," said Quil.

Mike shoved him in the shoulder. Quil shoved back. They knocked each other into ankle-deep puddles and started keeping score, laughing.

In the back of the group, Riley fell into step beside her, whispering, "Is _he_ your boyfriend?"

"No."

"It's Saturday night. Where's your invisible boyfriend?"

"Shut up."

"Wait, do you have an imaginary boyfriend?"

"No."

"I think you made him up. I'm hurt. You didn't want my milkshake last weekend, so you said you had a boyfriend."

"I have a boyfriend," she said through clenched teeth.

"My milkshake brings all the girls to the yard," he sang, still in a whisper.

Despite the sounds of the groaning truck engines, the splashing puddles, the hiss of tires on the wet road, and his conversation with Mike, and despite being twenty yards ahead of them, Quil hollered over his shoulder, "That song is about hand jobs. And she has a boyfriend, ass wipe."

Riley stumbled. "Is not. It's—"

"Don't even try," said Bella. "You cannot win a verbal battle with him."

Riley picked up a piece of gravel and tossed it at the back of Quil's head. Without looking, Quil's hand shot out to catch the tiny stone. "It's about hand jobs. Or, if you prefer, it's about—" And here he described certain unmentionable evidences of feminine arousal, in crude, disrespectful, and graphic detail.

Angela, walking in the middle of the group, turned around with her mouth hanging open, seeking in Bella's reaction a mirror for her shock and dismay. Bella shrugged. Mike, meanwhile, had turned to Quil with an expression of shock and curiosity, and Quil started to share his knowledge, which Bella could only assume came from the internet or the magazines under his mattress.

She jogged ahead of Riley to catch up with Angela. "Look at that; he's a bad influence on Mike. Seriously, you can't train—"

"Shhhh!" said Angela. She slipped back to walk with Riley, and Bella jogged ahead once more to squeeze between Mike and Quil, who was trying to describe something damp.

"Ah hem," said Mike. "There's a lady present."

Quil looked around. "Oh. That's just Bella."

 _And I love you, too, Quil,_ she thought.

As they got closer to the center of town, the graveled shoulder of the road gave way to a narrow sidewalk. They passed a hair salon, its windows dark, and the Umpqua Bank, a low brick building with evergreen hedges along the sidewalk. Mike brushed against their wet branches as he walked, so he stepped back, and Bella and Quil took the lead.

"How's Jacob?" she asked.

"Haven't seen him."

"Billy says he has mono."

Quil said that explained a lot. He, too, had been telephoning him every day for a week and had only reached him once.

"He sounded weird."

"Weird?"

"His voice was different." He went on about how Jake had missed a whole week of school, and how Billy, Harry, and even his own grandfather kept telling him not visit him. "Mono's pretty contagious, right? Makes sense?"

Bella looked at her red Chucks, soaked through. Her socks felt squishy. She couldn't say why, but it seemed like Quil wanted _her_ to reassure _him._

At the diner, Riley pulled Bella and her backpack into a booth in the back, and the other three took an adjacent table. The place was quiet for a Saturday, with only a few families with young kids and some lumberjack types in plaid flannel shirts at the counter. She looked down at her own flannel and suddenly blushed, remembering that the rest of her outfit included bags under her eyes and a stringy ponytail on the top of her head.

"You're cute when you blush," said Riley.

Quil pinged him in the ear with a hard kernel of a paper wad he'd made from a straw wrapper.

"Homework," said Bella firmly.

When their waiter came, Bella looked up in surprise.

"What can I get you?" said Tyler Crowley.

"You have a job?" she blurted.

Yes, he said flatly, obviously he had a job. She didn't have to act so shocked about it either. He said the same thing to Mike. As of when? Mike countered. As of today, said Tyler. He added that he was capable of being responsible and didn't appreciate their lack of faith.

"Is this for Lauren?" said Mike. "Not worth it, man."

Tyler looked at Mike, looked at the ceiling, and slowly shook his head.

They all ordered cheeseburgers and French fries. After the rain, and after a week of being sick, it felt so good, thought Bella, to fill herself with something hot and rich. She sprinkled extra salt on her fries just for the sensation of the tang. Riley ate quickly then sat back to watch her finish her meal, putting his feet up on the bench seat beside her, ankles crossed, his eyes sparkling with a smile. Mike and Quil got into a competition flipping tiny non-dairy creamer cups on the table, trying to make them rotate three hundred sixty degrees and land upright. They laughed so hard a couple of the men at the counter turned to look. Angela tried flipping the creamer cups, too, but they just rolled on their sides. She sighed. When she caught Bella's pitying glance, however, she straightened up.

"Training," she whispered. "This is not a problem."

Quil looked up. "Okay..." he said slowly, and Angela froze.

"Teaching," said Bella. "She means you should teach her to flip the things." This, figured Bella, was what wing men did. Wing women. _Hot diggity-dog, I'm helpful._

Quil, however, declared that cup-flipping was an innate, rather than learned skill. He flipped another one; then two at the same time; then four, using two fingers on each hand.

Riley moved to sit beside Angela. "Ten bucks I can teach her."

 _Very clever..._ thought Bella, half an hour later.

Riley made Angela positively _glow_. With one arm draped across the back of her chair, he sat close, bending over the tiny cups with her, coaching her on the best way to flick her finger. You had to do it, he said, right at the edge of the foil lid. He offered countless demonstrations, some of which worked, and some of which landed the cups on the floor. Tyler accidentally squished one when he walked by, and it shot out about a tablespoon's worth of gooey liquid, which he cleaned up with a "thanks a lot" look at Riley. "Sorry," he responded. Angela leaned over the table, laughing as she kept trying to flip the things. Her cheeks were pink, and the little drops of rain that were still in her hair sparkled in the glow of the dingy plastic chandelier above them.

Bella leaned back against the wall in her booth. She had never noticed it before, at least, she'd never noticed it with such intensity before, but the truth was that Angela was beautiful. When she felt good. She was absolutely beautiful. Her long brown hair fell over her shoulders. As she laughed and relaxed, her tall, slim frame, which Bella knew she was self-conscious about, became simply willowy, supple, graceful. Even her fingers looked beautiful, long and slender, with modest, pale pink polish. When she finally flipped a cup, she said, "OH!" like she'd scored a touchdown. She looked up at Quil, who looked back at her with his mouth open. Then he looked at Riley, and his eyes slowly narrowed as his heavy, black eyebrows sank into a frown.

"Pay up," said Riley.

The forfeiture turned into milkshake money. Riley bought chocolate milkshakes for everyone and asked Tyler to bring half a package of Oreos, too.

"We don't have Oreos."

"Tina has Oreos." Riley glanced at the cashier, a young woman with curly brown hair bent over her cell phone at the front counter. "In the fridge, behind the lettuce. She likes 'em cold."

Tyler looked uncertain.

"She's my step-sister. Fucking owes me four packages of Oreos. It's okay."

SoTyler brought out the Oreos with the milkshakes, and Riley made a gallant show of crumbling the cookies over the girls' milkshakes. "Wow, that's really good," said Angela, smiling up at him with her mouth puckered around the straw, looking absolutely _adorable_ , and Quil looked at the table as if it had deeply offended him, but he couldn't figure out how.

Bella began to worry again about her essay. After a while, she took her yellow notebook out of her backpack and turned its pages, rustling them in a soft reminder. Riley gave her a nod and mentioned the rain, which had gotten heavier, saying that if he didn't have to study with Bella, he would have jogged back to Ace to get his car so he could drive Angela and Mike home. Mike said that would have been nice. He hadn't driven to work today, so he was sans wheels.

The collective weight of four people's stares prodded Quil to speech.

"I, uh... I guess I could run back. Get my van."

Angela looked grateful.

Quil stood up. Something had happened. He backed toward the door. Riley got up and walked him out, leaning close to whisper something to him about women and milkshakes.

"I could teach you," he said, "but I'd have to charge."

Then he opened the door and shoved Quil out into the rain.

* * *

In the back booth, Riley looked over her notes. He listened to her hopeless tale of describing a dull, damaged life, and then he told her that the big secret, the thing the professors on the scholarship committee would probably be looking for, was context.

"Context?"

"Yep. Frame the whole thing in the context of the Great Depression. Skim over the national basics, talk a little about Washington, and then go into detail with Forks, Hoquiam, Aberdeen, logging, the Olympic National Park, stuff like that."

He helped her make a better outline. Then he twisted more Oreos apart, one by one, and scooped little mouthfuls of chocolate milkshake onto the cookie halves. Bella did the same.

"Tell me about your boyfriend."

She smiled. Told him a little about Jacob. How their fathers were friends. How she'd known him almost all her life, how he was her best friend, and how only recently had things changed between them into something more. But it was all so new that she wasn't sure what came next.

"He's sick. I haven't seen him in a week."

"Tragic."

"How about you?" She took another bite of cookie, thinking how odd this was: she, Bella Swan, having a conversation about dating, like a normal person. Like somebody who hadn't spent the past few months nervous and sick. It felt strange, but good. "How about you? You have a girlfriend?"

"No." He looked at the table. "Got my heart broke last winter." With his head down, she couldn't see his eyes; the brim of his green ball cap shaded his face. She looked at the wisps of honey brown hair curling near his ears, which were slightly pinker than before. "She's another history major. It's weird now, to see her. It's a huge department, thank God, but we're probably going to be in the same senior seminar next fall."

"That's okay?"

"Yeah. I think so. I mean, it has to be." He put his index finger in the bowl of a spoon and spun the handle side to side with his thumb.

Very quietly, Bella pushed past the knot in her throat and said, "I got my heart broke, too."

He lifted his head just enough for her to see a little smile beneath his visor. "I guessed that," he said.

"Why?"

"Your notebook. You said he was like a vampire."

Bella paled.

"You said, 'Vampires are really shitty ex-boyfriends.' Something like that." He laughed. "Sounds like he was a huge jerk."

Bella let out a breath. "You have no idea."

"You're too pretty to let that get you down. I mean, you're smart, too. I mean, being pretty isn't like immunity or something from misery. Sorry. I mean, you're pretty, definitely, but— I just mean, don't let it get you down." He lowered his head again, hiding his face. "Like Tina. She's texting some asshole every day, thinking if he likes her again she'll be okay. She has a serious problem with Oreos. But you, you're—"

Bella blushed again. "I'm not pretty."

"See? Girls always say that. It's stupid. You're pretty, okay? I dare you; say it."

"No." The word came out so quickly that she surprised herself.

"Say it."

Her eyes filled with tears. How had this conversation started?

"Come on." He picked up the spoon and waved it in front of her face as if it were a pocket watch on a chain to hypnotize her. "Say it or I'll make you squawk like a chicken instead."

She laughed. "Okay. Okay." She took a deep breath.

"Come on..."

"I'm pretty."

"Yes, you are. And I bet your boyfriend knows it, too."

"He does." It made her smile.

He smiled back at her, then leaned across the table and whispered, as if it were a huge secret, "I met a girl."

"Really?"

"Online. Don't laugh. She pinged me on Facebook, and we started emailing. She loves hiking, too, and wants me to show her around Forks. I think we might meet next weekend."

"Wow, cool."

"She's gorgeous. Gorgeous red hair. We talked on the phone once, and her voice— Oh, my God, she speaks French. She has this accent like— She could read the phone book to me, or the ingredients on a cereal box, and I'd... I hope she likes me."

"Of course she will!"

"I should do this, right? Meet somebody new?"

Bella picked up the spoon and waved it in front of his face. "Yes. You're a good guy. And nice. And smart. And pretty."

He laughed. They wrapped up the studying by reviewing her new outline and made plans to meet at the library tomorrow. She would write the essay tonight and bring it on a zip drive. He'd find some extra books for her to cite and help her with the works cited format.

"MLA," she said. "I can do it in my sleep."

"No!" He looked appalled. "Chicago style for history. Turabian." He stood up. "You should start writing it now."

"Now?"

"Yeah. Get a head start. Gimme ten minutes."

He paid their bill at the front counter before Bella could protest and slipped out the door. Through the window, she watched him jog down the street through the rain, back toward Ace Hardware, and when he returned in the big, rumbling car, she was ready to go. The windshield wipers swished back and forth as he drove her across town and parked on the graveled strip in front of her mailbox.

"Thank you," she said.

He got out and stood in the rain to open her door. It made her frown. "You're getting all wet."

"I'm already all wet."

She stood in the rain, too, holding her backpack to her chest, looking up at him.

"I really like you," he said.

"Me, too." She blushed. "I mean, you. I like you, too."

"See you tomorrow."

She climbed the porch steps and stood under the awning to watch him drive away.

* * *

Charlie was sitting on the living room couch when she came in. His eyes were red from lack of sleep. On the coffee table was a temptingly arranged plate of her freshly baked cookies, but not one was touched.

"No visit from Sam?" she asked.

Charlie turned his head slowly, raised one eyebrow at her, and returned his attention to the television. He was watching a movie with a lot of screaming, bad eighties hairstyles, and a steak crawling across a kitchen counter.

" _Poltergeist?"_ she said, picking up the DVD case from the video rental place downtown. "What's this?"

He lifted the remote control to pause the movie, then pinched the bridge of his nose.

"Ghosts. Evil spirits. Stuff that moves by itself."

Bella let her backpack slide from her shoulder and leaned against the door of the coat closet with her arms crossed.

"Are we haunted?" said Charlie.

"Huh?"

"Is there some kind of porthole to another dimension in your room?"

She stared at him.

"I don't like to go in there anymore. Makes my skin crawl. What's going on?"

Bella picked up her backpack again and began to back toward the kitchen. Why did this suddenly seem like she was in trouble? "How should I know?" she said defensively.

"So there _is_ something happening!" said Charlie. "Something is happening, even if you don't know what it is."

"I'm just going to do my homework now, okay?" She flipped on the kitchen light. It made Charlie squint. "I have to get this essay done tonight because I'm meeting someone tomorrow to make the final draft."

"Essay," muttered her father. "Right. Do that." He picked up the remote control again, and the steak resumed its creep across the tile. There was a little girl in the movie who was entranced by the television. She would kneel in front of it, listening for some kind of communication from the static.

"I can't think with that movie on," said Bella. "It's really weird."

"It's _research,"_ said her father.

Over the next hour, she labored at her computer on the kitchen table. With the help from Riley's new outline and her notes from history class, the essay quickly fell together. She was so relieved when she reached the final paragraph that she wanted to laugh. Had she really finished this thing, at last? She decided that she had. She reread it twice then got up and scooped herself of bowl of chocolate ice cream. She scooped a bowl for Charlie, too, and took it into the living room. On the television, a red gaping hole had appeared in a bedroom closet and was _pulling children_ toward it.

"Oh, God, what's _that?"_ she cried.

He didn't take his eyes from the screen. "It's the porthole."

Bella carried her ice cream back to the kitchen and ate alone. Then she climbed the stairs to get ready for bed. She brushed her teeth and crossed the hall to her room. When she opened the door, a powerful scent of old flowers hit her. It was getting stronger, making her feel dizzy. Quickly, she changed into her pajamas. She cracked open her closet door and peeked in there, cursing Charlie and his movie.

"Now I can't sleep in my room!" she hollered downstairs. "Thanks a lot!"

"I don't want you to sleep in there anyway!" he hollered back. "Ghost of a cheap whore!"

"Not haunted! This place is not haunted!"

"Smells like a crypt. Get _out_!"

She stomped downstairs. The movie was over. Charlie was in the kitchen. He gave her a large manilla envelope addressed to Evergreen State University, saying that he'd filled out all the papers for her.

"Thank you."

Before he went to bed, Charlie unrolled his hand drawn map and added a swirling green tornado-like mark in the location of their house.

Bella curled up on the couch and turned off the light. It was nearly eleven o'clock. Except for the soft glow of a streetlamp a few houses down the road, the night was deep and black; it took her eyes several minutes to get used to the darkness, and even then, she eyed the living room furniture as if it were a collection of unfamiliar beasts: the hunched recliner; the sinuous curtains. _This shouldn't bother me_ , she thought. _I have lived through two vampire attacks._ But it was hard to shake that movie. After a long time, she thought she might rest better in her room after all. She climbed the stairs and discovered that before Charlie had gone to bed, he'd taken a bath towel, rolled it up like a snake, and wedged it under the bottom lip of her door. She returned to the couch.

* * *

When she awoke, sun was up and the house was quiet.

"Dad?" she called.

But Charlie was gone. He had left a note on the table saying that he was out with Joy. Bella opened a cupboard to get some cereal when her eyes fell on the clock. It was nearly two! She was supposed to meet Riley at one! She dropped the cereal box. Raisin bran scattered over the floor and she left it there as she raced upstairs to use the bathroom and brush her teeth. She made sure her essays were saved on the zip drive on her key chain and left her yellow notebook and scribbled drafts on the kitchen table. Then she ran outside with her backpack and hopped in her truck. She was pulling into the library parking lot when she realized she was still wearing a pair of flannel pajama pants with penguins on them and a matching flannel shirt.

"Nice," smirked Riley.

She thanked him for waiting for her, and he gave her his cell phone number. They found a computer terminal and pulled up Bella's essay.

It looks great, he said. He walked her through the Turabian citation format as she added supporting evidence from some of the sources he offered. It took a couple hours. Then he looked over her supplemental essays, saying that they were also very good.

"Really?"

"Yes, really. You're good at this. You'll totally get it."

She knew he meant the scholarship. "I hope so."

"You'll get it."

She submitted her essays online, printed them as well, and added them to Charlie's big envelope. Riley walked her out to her old red truck.

"Thanks again," she told him. She leaned against her truck, holding the envelope to her chest.

He shrugged.

"You're— Really nice. Really." _This is like the opposite of Edward,_ she thought. _Someone helping me get into college instead of blowing my chances._ It surprised her. Before she could stop herself she blurted, "Why? Why are you being so nice to me?"

Riley looked at the sky, where dark clouds were gathering, and then he looked at her with brown eyes that seemed suddenly close enough to make her flush. "You probably don't want me to answer that."

"Oh." She blushed more, and then stood there staring at the asphalt.

"Yeah."

So she held out her hand. It seemed like the thing to do when thanking someone and saying goodbye. It seemed like a very official way to conclude a business arrangement, and a good way to draw a line between them. Sort of backing away. But when he took her hand, it seemed like a mistake. His skin was smooth and warm. He pressed her fingers softly.

"Bye, Bella."

She drove away feeling confused and upset. On her way to the post office, she stopped at the Chinook Pharmacy and bought a get well card for Jacob. " _Dear Jake,"_ she wrote, " _I miss you so much. I hope you will feel better soon. Call me any time. Let me know when I can come see you. Your dad said not to come. I'm thinking of you."_ She wondered how she should sign it. _Love?_ No. Too much. Too scary. _Yours? From?_ She finally just wrote her name with a dash in front of it, then thought it was too cold, so she wrote again, _I miss you,_ and sealed the envelope before she could make it worse. She stopped at the post office. It was closed, but the lobby was unlocked. She bought stamps from the machine there and dropped her application and Jacob's card—she had known his address since she was six—into the brass slot in the wall beside the front counter. Then she drove home.

Charlie's cruiser was in the driveway, so she knew he was home from his date with Joy. She wondered where they had gone and what they had done. Then she felt disgusted, wishing she hadn't thought about that. She slammed her truck's door shut and climbed the porch steps.

It began to rain. Hard. Huge drops pattered on the roof, and the gutters soon filled with water that flowed through the downspouts and poured into Charlie's garden. The new mulch he'd put around his rhododendron bushes was going to get washed away.

Bella stood on the porch as the air cooled and mist damped her cheeks, as the rain hammered on the roof of the cruiser and in the bed of her truck. She thought about Joy and frowned, thought about Riley and frowned more, then thought about Billy and frowned even more. Then she thought of Riley again, the way he'd made Angela feel like a queen, the way he'd schooled Quil, the way he'd helped her...that was all good...but also the way he'd looked at her and touched her hand at the library. That was bad. But nice.

 _No. It was bad._

She cupped her hands over her mouth and nose and took a deep breath.

 _Jacob, where are you? What's wrong?_

Angela was right; Jacob could have crawled to the phone at some point in the past week since _she_ had been sick, too, and managed to call him every single day.

 _It's okay,_ she told herself, blinking back a tear. _He's sick. I'll see him soon._ She shook her hands to release some of her tension and turned the knob on the front door.

If Bella were a different kind of person—more sensitive, perhaps, to circumstances beyond the end of her nose—she might have noticed the cold weight of the air in her living room. She might have noticed the stillness in the house, the way the cookies were perfectly arranged on a tray on the coffee table with two fresh yet untouched mugs of coffee steaming beside them. She might have noticed that despite Charlie's being at home, the house was perfectly silent. In the past year, her life had been gone through so many violent storms that she was used to the turbulence. It was hard to recognize stillness because it was almost forgotten. But slowly, she began to have an uneasy feeling. Something was happening. Something had changed. When she rounded the corner into the kitchen, she suddenly realized that this stillness was only the eye of the hurricane.

Charlie was sitting at the kitchen table reading her yellow notebook.

* * *

 **Thank you for reading!**

Questions...

1\. Charlie: Oh, my gosh, what now?

2\. Angela: What do you think of her plan to train Quil?

3\. Riley: What do you think of him? Is he being too friendly to Bella? If so, is that wrong? Should I kill him?

 _Dear readers, thanks for all your wonderful comments after the last chapter. It was so rewarding to know there are readers who are still interested in my characters. There were a few people to whom I didn't reply individually, and I'm sorry about that. I have a job now, and it's harder to find time to write (as you may have noticed since it's been 4 months since I started writing this chapter!). Please forgive me. I hope to hear from you again. And I hope you enjoyed this chapter._


	3. Chapter 3 The Storm

**Chapter Three**

 **"The Storm"**

Bella stood frozen in the kitchen doorway. The sound of the rain hammering on the roof seemed to grow in intensity until it became like an external pulse, as if the pulse of the sky were her own: frenetic, slamming hard against the immutable fact of a roof, against the immutable fact of what Charlie was reading right now, written with a blue ballpoint pen in her yellow notebook, in her own unmistakable, irregularly swooping penmanship: _Vampires are real._

Charlie was frowning at the book, his eyebrows drawn together with two sharp, vertical creases above the bridge of his nose. He lifted the corner of the page, turned it, and looked at the next one, where Bella had written some notes about the price of wheat in 1936. Then he went back to the previous page and read it again. He squeezed all of his fingertips together, as if pinching something with his whole hand, and pressed his fingertips hard against the center of his forehead. When he took them away, Bella saw tiny white marks left by his nails. Then he made a fist, pressing his knuckles against his forehead. He ran his hands through his hair, over and over, scratching his scalp. He pressed his fingertips to his temples, made a fist again and pressed it to his mouth. Then he slammed it on the table with a thump that made her keyboard clatter and a spoon slide onto the floor.

"What?!" he said. The word came out very slowly, but with force.

Bella clasped her hands in front of her heart, holding her elbows tight against her sides.

"What?!" he said again. "What is this?"

"I don't know."

"You don't _know?_ You don't _know?_ "

Bella was glad to have the table between them.

"You are a stupid girl! You had this thing in my house?!"

She began to back away.

"My head is exploding! This is should not make sense. Are you— Is this a joke?" His face was red now, and his eyes glittered with adrenaline. "Is this the link? Are you trying to make me insane? Why are you doing this to me?"

"I'm not—"

"This is not real!"

"I'm sorry."

"Jesus God!" He swore more and more forcefully. "' _Real, really shitty ex-boyfriends'?"_ he quoted from her notebook. "That pasty, pale, fish-belly-white freak of a boy! And the sister! Miss Perky Pants? And the doctor? His Stepford Wife? The whole—"

"They were nice people."

"They were _vampires_ living in a glass mansion in the woods like a nest of vipers! Did they kill these people? These hikers?"

"No."

"Did they kill other people?"

Her eyes filled with tears.

"You said, 'Edward killed someone.' I thought he was in a gang! I thought he was tangled up with a rich kid's heroine addiction and chronic constipation!"

"What?"

"His face! Always looking so pained and scrunched up, like he was trying not to—"

"No, no, no..." She could see the thought forming in his mind. He was getting up from the table, keeping his fingertips on the formica to steady himself as he came around to her side. She backed into the living room.

"Like he was trying not to _eat_ you! _EAT YOU!"_ He screamed these words at her. He had never screamed at her before, and she put her hands up to her ears, cringing, her elbows still tight against her ribs, as she backed into the coffee table and staggered to the other side of it. "You pick a boyfriend who wants to _eat you?!_ Where are your senses? You stupid girl!"

She stumbled and yelped as her ankle struck the brick hearth behind her.

Charlie paced back to the kitchen, running his hands through his hair again, scratching his scalp, then wrapping his arms around himself, saying, "No, no, no, no, this is not real."

"Okay," said Bella. "It's okay."

 _"_ _THIS IS NOT OKAY!"_ He turned and rushed at her, and she tripped over the footrest of his recliner, landed on her hip, and crawled behind the sofa. He stalked to the other side of it to yell at her as she curled into a ball on the hardwood floor. " _THIS IS NOT OKAY!_ You pick friends who want to kill you! You bring these things to my house! You stupid, stupid girl!"

She closed her eyes, hands over her ears, and curled herself as tight as she could.

"You think that's fun?! That's fun to you?! Were you looking for some kind of thrill, like, 'Gee, I wonder if my boyfriend will kill me today?' What is _wrong_ with you?! You wanted excitement?!"

"I wanted someone to love me!"

"You what?!"

"I just— He said he loved me." She was crying now, but pretty sure Charlie wasn't going to slap her. She sat up a little, pulling her knees to her chest, and sobbed into her hands. "I wanted to be loved! Nobody ever—"

"Nobody loved you?"

"No." She suddenly had a vision of herself in the backseat of Renee's car. She was eleven. They had been driving for hours down an Arizona highway, and when she lay her cheek on the window, the glass was so hot that it burned her a little. She had cried out, but Renee didn't say anything. Renee turned off the highway and drove into the desert on a red dirt road smooth as silk. They had met a man out there, and he and Renee made love in the back of his mobile home while Bella tried to watch TV. The red mark on her face lasted for three days, and Renee never noticed. "Nobody loved me!" she cried.

"I LOVE YOU!" shouted Charlie. "I DO! And Harry and Sue! All my friends. They ask about you. They look at your pictures, see how you're growing. For years I got my daughter only in the mail, over the phone, and now you sit here and cry because nobody loved you? I got school pictures sometimes only because _Phil_ remembered to send them! I used to pray to God: Please let Renee marry Phil so someone will take care of Bella! Jesus!" He swung his arm wide, looking for something to hit, and found a lamp. It fell off an end table and the bulb shattered. "You're my whole _life!"_ he shouted. " _I_ love you! Your grandparents! Harry and Sue and Billy and— Oh, Jesus Christ, Bella, I can think of someone who loves you very much, and who you have been treating like a tag-along little shit for years."

"I'm sorry," she sobbed.

"Vampires?"

"No?"

"Vampires."

"Sort of."

"How can someone be 'sort of' a vampire? Either you're a vampire or you're— Why am I saying this? This is NOT REAL." He turned and slammed his fist against the wall, then leaned forward with his head on his hand. He remained there for ten minutes or more, and Bella lay her head on her knees and wept silently.

After a long time, there was a knock on the front door. When neither of them moved, the knob twisted back and forth, tentatively, and the door was pushed open about an inch.

"Hello?" said a young man's voice. "Chief Swan?"

Charlie straightened up and blinked.

"Is this a bad time?"

"No! This is fine."

Bella was moderately horrified to see her father's transformation. He smiled. He strode to the door and opened it wide. "Sam!" he said. "Great to see you. Come on in."

Sam looked hesitant. But Charlie held out his arm, so he carefully crossed the threshold and stood stiffly in the entry way as Charlie closed the door behind him. The lock made a tiny _click_ when he turned it.

"Please," said Charlie, "have a seat." He directed Sam to the sofa, then he sat down in his recliner and leaned back, putting his feet up and crossing his ankles.

Sam looked at the lamp, lying on the floor, and the many tiny shards of glass scattered around it. "I could come back later if..."

"No, no," said Charlie. "Have some cookies." He pointed to the platter still perfectly arranged on the coffee table. "And Bells, pick up that lamp, would you?" To Sam he said, whispering behind his hand as if it were a man-to-man kind of secret, "She's a little clumsy."

Bella, still sitting on the floor behind the sofa, went red with indignation. She crawled to the lamp, picked it up, and plopped it back onto the table. A few more shards of glass fell out of the lamp shade with a tinkling sound.

Charlie smiled and pointed to the cookies.

Slowly, Sam leaned forward, chose one, and nibbled its edges.

"And you know what goes good with cookies?" said Charlie.

Sam shrugged.

"Coffee."

There were two mugs of coffee still on the table. When Bella had arrived home after studying with Riley, they had been steaming hot. Now they looked worse than flat cola, with a few sticky bubbles scummed to the sides of the mugs.

"Why don't you warm those up for us, Bells?"

Bella stood up and frowned at her father. He smiled and said, "Shoo, shoo," an expression which must have rubbed off on him from Joy. Frowning more, she picked up the mugs and took them to the microwave. While it hummed and the mugs spun around on the turn table, she peeked around the corner. Sam was dressed in jeans and a tight-fitting blue T-shirt. His hair was longer than it had been the last time she'd seen him, and he looked uncomfortable with its growth; he kept trying to tuck strands behind his ears, though it couldn't have been longer than an inch. He leaned forward with his forearms on his knees, looking at the coffee table with his face screwed up, as if he wanted to speak but couldn't decide what to say, and then he sighed and leaned back against the couch, tipping his head back to stare at the ceiling.

"Tough day?" said Charlie.

Sam closed his eyes and sighed again.

"Been there," said Charlie.

The microwave beeped. Bella carried the mugs back to the coffee table and set them down carefully. She got a broom and swept up the glass on the floor, and then, because there was no other place to sit, she perched on the edge of the couch next to Sam. He sat up straighter and brought his arms closer to his sides.

"Have a cookie," said Charlie.

Sam lifted the cookie he'd already chosen and took another nibble. He glanced sideways at Bella and looked away again quickly. They sat there in silence for a couple minutes, then Charlie lifted the remote control, saying, "Basketball?" and at the same time Sam stood up and said, "Maybe I'd better go."

When Charlie protested, Sam glanced again at Bella and said maybe it was too late in the evening for a visit. It's six o'clock, said Charlie, but Sam just backed toward the door, saying that he could tell they hadn't been expecting visitors. Charlie looked between Bella and Sam for a moment, then said, "Bells, are those your pajamas?"

Bella groaned. She _was_ still wearing last night's pajamas. She had awakened late to meet Riley, rushed out of the house madly, and sat with him in the library in flannel humility while he smirked at her. The clerk at the Chinook Pharmacy had smirked at her, too, when she'd bought a get well card for Jacob. Now she looked down at her baggy pajamas, printed with penguins, and was suddenly conscious of the fact that she hadn't washed her face in thirty-six hours and she wasn't wearing a bra. Before Charlie could say anything else, she walked to the stairs.

In the bathroom upstairs, she looked in the mirror. Her eyes were red from crying, and her skin looked too pale. As she dragged a brush through her hair, her hand shook. She stared at her reflection, thinking that splashing a little water on her face and brushing her hair were not going to do much to improve her haggard, sick-for-a-week, ashen, bleary-eyed appearance. But she washed her face anyway and used a washcloth to freshen up under her arms. She washed her upper chest, too, and the back of her neck. Then she held onto the edges of the sink and looked hard into her face in the mirror.

This was bad, she figured. Very bad. Charlie was downstairs being _nice_ to Sam, and Sam, as far as she could tell, was walking right into Charlie's trap. But what could Sam have to say that would interest Charlie, compared to what he'd just read in her notebook? Any minute now, Charlie would probably send Sam on his way. And then he'd come looking for her.

She thought about where she could go. Angela's house? No. Too close. Seattle? What on earth would she do there? Well, she figured, it would probably be smart to go _somewhere_ until things settled down. Maybe after a few weeks, Charlie would convince himself that he'd been imagining things. She brushed her hair into a purposeful ponytail and crossed the hall.

The rolled up bath towel that Charlie had wedged under her bedroom door was still there. She tugged it away, opened her door, and was hit with such a heavy, powerful odor that she clapped a hand over her nose and mouth.

Everything seemed to happen at once after that.

Sam appeared, shoving her to the wall as he burst into the room, shouting, "Stay back!" and "Who's there?" In mere moments, he yanked the sheets from her bed with one quick tug, flung open her closet door and delivered several swift kicks to her clothes, the heel of his boot crunching through the plaster on the back wall. "Stop, stop!" she cried, and then Charlie came running up the stairs, saying, "Sam!" in a low, commanding tone. Sam flattened himself against the wall and scanned the ceiling, panic in his face. A second later, he ripped her curtains away from the window by tugging the rod off the wall. Bella stared at him, horrified, and he stared back at her in fear and agony. His eyes were watering. "What have you got in here?"

She was too stunned to reply.

He flipped her bed onto its side. Bella's lamp fell off the bedside table—there went another lightbulb—and Sam dropped to his knees, running his nose over the cracks between the planks of the floor. He coughed; he gasped, "pencil," and when she didn't move he grabbed a pencil from her desk and probed a crack with the sharp end. He bent it like a lever, and it broke. "Spoon!" he said.

"What?"

"Fuck it." He stomped one end of her curtain rod into a flat blade and wedged it between her floor boards. When that broke, too, he stood up and called for a hammer. To Bella's surprise, Charlie actually went downstairs. He hurried, in fact, and Bella heard him banging around in the cupboards in the laundry room on the back porch. Sam paced from wall to wall, his hands shaking. He hollered, "Clawfoot!" and when Charlie returned, he pried up one of her floorboards.

That's when things got worse.

Sam yelped. He fell backwards, scrambling away from the hole. Bella leaned forward and saw some things she never thought she would see again: her photographs of Edward, missing from her album, the plane tickets his parents had given her, and the CD on which Edward had recorded his lullaby.

"Hey..." she said slowly. "My stuff."

"This is _yours_?" gasped Sam. He picked up one of the photos and dropped it like it had burned him. "This is _yours_?"

"Gimme my stuff," she said, but Sam was making a high keening sound, his eyes wide and watering, his whole body trembling. "Sam..." said Charlie again, in a voice that would have terrified Bella into better behavior, but Sam paid him no attention. He shucked the pillow out of her pillow case and used a corner of her bed sheet to pick up the things in the hole and drop them into the pillow case.

"Gimme my stuff," she said again, coming toward him, but Sam leaped up, eyed her doorway, where Charlie was standing, and then he turned the lock on her window, slid the glass up, knocked the screen onto the lawn below, and actually _jumped out._ Bella and Charlie ran to the window in time to see him land on his feet, sprint across the rainy backyard, and disappear into the trees.

* * *

Later, Charlie had to explain it all to Bella. She hadn't reacted well. She wasn't herself. He had to explain it all while she lay on the couch, shivering beneath an afghan. She tried to put it all together in her mind, but it was so hard. She slept on the couch that night, and these were the things she understood from the latter half of that evening.

1\. Charlie had shouted for Sam to come back, and Bella had hung out the window, howling for her things in a way that frightened him badly. It was so much worse than the way she used to scream during her nightmares. "I don't remember that," she said, but Charlie told her that's what happened.

2\. Charlie had had an altercation with Billy. "Altercation" was the word he might have used on a police report, but Bella did remember a little bit of this happening, and "altercation" seemed an inadequate word. She had been on the back porch with a handcuff around one ankle, fastened to the pipe that carried water to the washing machine. The door was open and she lay on the floor, breathing the cold, misty, piney air, and listening to a rough, buzzing sort of sound. Later, Charlie explained that it was the sound of her breathing. He explained that she needed fresh air, and he apologized for the cuffing, but he had been too panicked to think of anything better. Bella had stretched herself from the washing machine to the open door, where she lay gasping and staring into the forest. That's when she heard the altercation.

3\. The altercation occurred over the phone. It lasted only a short time, but it made her pulse spike. She felt the blood roaring in her ears. She also caught some of her father's words, words like _trust_ and _daughter_ and _Cullen_. Words like _murder._ She also heard Charlie say, and she remembered this sentence quite clearly because of the stone cold way it sounded: "This isn't about tribal business. This isn't even about facts anymore; it's about friendship. And my child." That was the end of the altercation. If Charlie had had a knife, he might have slit Billy's throat over the phone.

4\. Her father's brown eyes were flecked with green. She'd never noticed this before because she'd never spent an hour staring into them. But from about seven o'clock until eight-thirty or so, he had sat on the laundry room floor with her. He had propped her up against the washing machine and said her name, over and over, while she struggled to focus her eyes. He held her face in his hands and said, "Vampires?" and "Tell me everything," but she hadn't been able to speak. Charlie had taken her hands and squeezed them, then he turned her palms up and stared at them, horrified. "What's this?" he said, lifting her left palm to her field of vision. She saw the hard, knotty place that James had bitten, the place that had turned to stone. Then she saw nothing, and heard nothing, but she could feel Charlie crying because he was clutching her to his chest.

5\. Charlie had gone through her room and her truck. She only knew this because the rain had increased. It was splashing on the back steps and through the open door of the laundry room. It fell on her face as she strained to be nearer to the trees. It fell on her face, cold and clear, and she heard the sounds of furniture being moved upstairs, drawers opening and closing. She heard the hammer tapping on the floor and knew he was looking for hollow spots. A few minutes later, she heard her truck's door open.

6\. The couch was far more comfortable than the laundry room floor. After Charlie carried her there, he opened the windows, despite the cold night air, despite the mist that blew through the screens. She lay on the couch under an afghan, shivering, with a pillow beneath her head and Charlie sitting in a kitchen chair that he'd dragged there to be near her face. "Look at me," he kept saying, "Open your eyes," but Bella thought she was already looking at him.

7\. There was a knock at the door. He got up to open it, and Bella heard the sound of the rain again; it was coming from all directions now, from the laundry room door, from the living room windows and the kitchen windows, where Charlie had tried to create a cross-breeze, and now from the front porch. There was a long pause while she heard the rain pounding on the porch roof. Then Charlie said, "Does Billy know you're here?" and a man said, "No." Charlie let him in the house and dragged another kitchen chair into the living room. The man sat beside her father. He held her left hand and looked at it carefully.

8\. The man stayed all night at her house, talking with Charlie in the kitchen, in the living room, and upstairs in her bedroom, where she heard the furniture being pushed around again. She struggled to open her eyes, but it was impossible.

9\. In the morning, she was awakened by the humming of the microwave. She rolled to her side and saw Charlie asleep in his easy chair. Sunlight came through the curtains, just as it would on any other Monday morning. But today, she had a feeling that she wouldn't be going to school. She tried to sit up and found that she still had a cuff around one ankle, only now she was fastened to the couch. When the microwave oven beeped, she heard more sounds from the kitchen: the microwave's door, the refrigerator, the clink of a knife on the glass butter dish. Then Harry Clearwater came around the corner with a muffin and a glass of orange juice.

10\. Charlie told her he was sorry he had called her a stupid girl. "I'm sorry, honey. You're a very smart girl, but sometimes you do stupid things." Harry set his breakfast on the coffee table and said dryly, "You can say that again."

* * *

 _Thank you for reading, and thanks to all who reviewed the last chapter._ I'm sorry I didn't send individual thank you notes this time. As I mentioned before, I have a job now which seriously cuts into my time for stuff I like to do, such as correspond with you all! But I did manage to finish this little chapter, which I hope you enjoyed.

Questions

1\. What do you think about the extent to which Bella claimed responsibility for her actions? Good job, Bella?

2\. Charlie's reaction?

3\. What should I do now with the friendship between Harry, Billy, and Charlie? How do they weigh secrets like theirs against others' safety and the expectations of friendship?

Thank you again, everyone. I hope to hear from you, and I'll try harder to get back to you! The next chapters should be pretty interesting.

Au revoir.


	4. Chapter 4 The Arrow and the Archer

**Chapter Four**

 **"The Arrow and the Archer"**

Charlie owned a rifle. He kept it locked in a cabinet in the back of the coat closet, and he kept the cartridges locked in a drawer in his bedroom, separate, like a responsible gun owner. He also had a Glock 22 handgun, issued by the State of Washington, but of course it was only to be used for police business. Charlie wasn't sure if vampires fell under his jurisdiction. Charlie wasn't even sure if vampires were people. Maybe, he posited, they were animals who used to be people. Animals who looked like people and preyed on people. A rifle seemed the right choice for hunting big game.

"Ain't gonna work," said Harry.

Bella, too, shook her head.

It was Monday morning. She was feeling clear headed, though teary and scared. Charlie had uncuffed her ankle. He said he was sorry about it, but that she'd tried many times in the night to run out toward the forest. She grimaced and went upstairs to use the bathroom. Peeking into her bedroom, she saw that it was still a mess: her curtains torn from the wall, her bed flipped over, her sheets in a swirl on the hardwood floor. And there was the hole where Edward's things had been. She knelt and looked into it. It was just a little space between the beams that held up the drywall on which the living room ceiling was plastered. Charlie had pried up several other floorboards during the night, and her room looked like a pocked field with a dozen more possible hidey-holes exposed. All empty. She stuck her nose in Edward's hole and caught one faint whiff of rotting flowers. Then it was gone.

She had been wearing the same pajamas since Saturday night. Now that Harry was downstairs trying to answer Charlie's questions about vampires, she figured she might as well indulge in the luxury of a hot shower. A very _long_ hot shower. She knew Charlie had a lot of questions for her, too.

As she shampooed her hair, she wondered if she was in trouble or not. If she had done anything wrong or not. And whether she should be angry at her father for reading her notebook... or not. Suds rinsed down her shoulders, arms, and legs, and she leaned forward with her forehead on the tile, watching the white bubbles slide toward the drain, as the warm water beat on her back. She could feel her muscles softening. As much as she didn't want to go down there and talk to him, she wondered if maybe, deep down, a frightened, desperate, and weary part of herself had done it on purpose: left her notebook on the table, open to that particular page.

In her room, she put on clean underwear and some jeans. She picked up a white T-shirt and a green plaid flannel shirt from the floor of her closet, where they had fallen when Sam kicked the crap out of her closet last night. Why had he done that? How had he found Edward's things? Why had he taken them? And how could he possibly have jumped out of her second story window, landed on his feet, and raced into the forest behind her house without even a sprained ankle?

She found a comb and stood at the top of the stairs, pulling it through her wet hair and listening to the conversation down in the living room. It went something like this:

Charlie: Vampires? How is this possible?

Harry: Beats me.

Charlie: You have got to be fucking shitting me.

Harry: Sorry.

Bella remembered when she had figured out the secret. The cold touch of Edward's hand on the radio dial. The way his eyes changed color. His unfathomable speed and strength, saving her from Tyler's van in the school parking lot. She had started sleuthing around, and how exciting it had been! While walking on the beach with Jacob, she had flirted—poorly—some information out of him, mainly his father's superstitious dislike of the Cullens and some old legends that made him roll his eyes. Then she'd bought the book of myths at the bookshop in Port Angeles, Edward had miraculously appeared to save her from thugs, and he had treated her to a dinner of mushroom ravioli and Coke while revealing that he could hear others' thoughts. What are the people around us thinking about, she had wanted to know. And he replied, _Money, money, sex, money, sex, sex, sex, money, cat._ And she had laughed. Laughed! Now, when she saw herself in that memory, it was like looking at some other girl.

Downstairs, the men were still talking.

Charlie: Silver bullets, garlic, crucifix, holy water, mirrors? Burning up in the sun?

Harry: Nope.

Charlie: Coffins?

Harry: More like Bentleys. Maseratis.

Charlie: Rich pricks.

Bella sighed. She put her comb away in the bathroom and paused at the top of the stairs again, listening.

Charlie: They smell funny?

Harry: Some people like it.

 _Yeah..._ thought Bella. _That would have been me._ She went into her room and replaced the boards Charlie had pried up, stamping on them to wedge them back into place. Then she tried to fix her bed. It was impossible to right it as quickly as it had been overturned. She had to slide her mattress and box spring completely off the frame, struggle to upright it, then huff and puff to lift a corner of the box spring onto the bed rail. Her wet hair swung in her face as she shoved it into place. Lifting the mattress itself was even harder, for it bent and wiggled like a giant noodle, and she nearly slipped on her tangled sheets.

"Get down here now, Bella!" called Charlie.

She left her mattress half-flopped onto the box spring.

An hour later, she was thinking, _They might as well have tied me to this chair_. Charlie and Harry had stared and stared at her as she tried to answer their questions, most of which amounted to, "What were you _thinking_?" Maybe, she thought, this was what other kids felt like who had two parents, two parents who would prod her into a kitchen chair and obligate her to remain there while they lectured her. Whenever Charlie had to pause to rub the heel of his hand on his forehead, Harry took up the slack with statements about what was, he called it, the yawning chasm between her book-smarts and her common sense, between her idea of adventure and self-preservation, and between her apparent IQ and her deeply misguided, at best, understanding of a loving relationship.

"For example," said Harry, "Sue and I have a good thing going because I'm not constantly fighting with myself about maybe eating her. Or hurting her in some way. Never! I never think that. Jesus, girl, nobody should think that." He passed a hand down his face, scratching his chin, mumbling, "The kids, though, that's different. Could have strangled them a thousand times."

Charlie reached out a hand to pat Harry's shoulder.

"And what's more," Harry continued, "Sue's Makah. I'm Quileute. Our kids are half and half, sort of. Where was I going with this?"

"Dating," supplied Charlie.

"Yes. Sue and I are from different worlds, but we're both people. Human beings. We dated, and then we fell in love, got married, and had kids. Normal, normal, normal. Except the kids."

"Kids," groaned Charlie.

"Two human beings, living a normal life, having kids. Don't you want to have a normal life, Bella? Live to see tomorrow? Grow up? Fall in love with a human being, have some kids?"

"No?" she said.

Charlie got up, opened the refrigerator, and looked in there as if he could find some kind of sustenance that would make this all go away.

"You don't want to live?" said Harry.

She blinked at him. Then she stammered, "No, I— I mean, kids. I don't want kids. I'm eighteen."

"Kids are great," said Harry.

"She doesn't want to live," said Charlie. His face was red. He made a choked sound, rubbed his hands across his eyes, and opened a cupboard to look for some instant coffee.

"Oh, Bella," said Harry.

The morning wore on. Around lunch time, she began to wish that Billy were here. He was the kind of guy, she realized, who tore off bandaids and poked wounds with a lit firecracker. Things went quicker that way. She remembered how he yelled at her that day when she'd first crashed the motorcycle, how he had grabbed her arm and dragged her against his chair. Gosh, that sounded like fun now. Charlie kept crying, and after a while Harry got up, went out the back door, and returned to the table with handfuls of damp grass that he'd yanked out of the yard, bits of soil still clinging to the delicate white roots.

"Here," he said, crushing the green blades and waving their fresh scent under her nose. "This is real; this is alive. It's the earth."

She looked at him blankly. "Can I go now?"

"No!" the fathers shouted.

Then _both_ of them started crying. Harry apologized, again and again, for not telling Charlie about this problem sooner. He tried to say that Billy had warned Bella more than once, but that Bella was stubborn. Still, said Harry, it didn't excuse his silence. "You knew all along?" said Charlie. "I did," said Harry. "I'm so sorry." Bella had never seen two grown men crying together. It felt weird. She tried to slip out of the room, but they called her back. Was this part of her punishment, she wondered? To watch two guys rub their eyes and blow their noses on the hateful hot pink dishtowels that came from Joy Ateara's biscuits?

Charlie was appalled, deeply hurt, that his best friends had kept something like this from him—especially when his daughter was involved, not to mention the safety of everybody in town.

"I know," said Harry. "It hurts my heart."

Charlie called them both a lot of bad names, really bad names that made Bella blanche, but Harry took it willingly. The only thing he said in his defense was that he was here now, in Charlie's house, coming clean, unlike someone else. It made another tear roll down Charlie's face. "Why?" he asked. "Why you and not Billy?"

"Because it's hurting my heart. Literally. I wake up with chest pains. I think I'm going to die from the pain of lying to you. Acting like everything's fine. I can't sleep. And I know you've felt worse, I know it."

Bella tried again to slip away, but Harry stomped on her foot under the table and she fell back into her chair.

Outside, it seemed like it was going to be a nice day. The sun was bright on the green lawn. The dew had burned off the ferns that bordered the garage, and the fronds stretched tall now, soaking up the light. Down the block, she could hear the laughter of some neighbors and the plastic rumble of a little kid's wagon. Inside, things were considerably less fresh. Charlie's hair was standing up all over his head. Harry wore the same tan, rumpled cotton sweater he'd arrived in last night. His brown hands were chapped and cracked, and his skin was so rough that his fingers had gathered a few tiny threads of pink fluff from the towels. Bella was aghast, fascinated, flabbergasted: how hard did a guy have to work to develop hands that were so rough he couldn't help pulling fuzz from towels? She stared at them. Charlie put his forearms on his thighs and leaned forward, looking at the floor, letting his own hands hang loosely between his knees. He was silent for a long time before he said, "I'm going to trust you. Let's trust each other."

The way he said this reminded Bella of the way some people said, "Let's make a deal," when there wasn't any option to _not_ make a deal. Slowly, he cleared the table and wiped it clean. Then, to Bella's surprise, he took his rolled up, hand drawn map from the top of the refrigerator and spread it open. "This," he said, "is _my_ secret." Harry's eyes drifted over the map, left to right, north to south, and he sucked in a breath and held it.

"Look at this." Charlie oriented the paper so that Harry sat facing north. "Here's the Park," he said, indicating the Olympic Mountains and their dashed border in orange. "Here's my house," he said, pointing that out, "and here's La Push," which was outlined in purple. "And here's your historic possession," he added, indicating the dashed purple lines that extended the Quileute and Hoh territories up the Hoh River valley and toward the glaciers. Harry's eyes widened, and Bella felt a tiny hot rush of pride in her father. Charlie had done his homework. His badass, scary cop homework.

"Here are the animal attacks," continued Charlie, darkening the black X's where the hikers and his friend Waylon had died. "Vampires?" he asked, and Harry seemed to struggle to speak. Charlie raised an eyebrow, waiting for him. Harry swallowed hard, opened his mouth, but couldn't make a sound. Instead, stiffly, he nodded.

Charlie took a deep breath, letting that soak in.

"Did they—" Harry paused. "Those people. Did they— suffer?"

"Yes."

Harry teared up again, and Bella slid a slightly damp pink dishtowel across the table to him.

Charlie darkened the arc he had made, a semi-circle on the map on the east side of Forks, where the attacks had occurred. "One more question," said Charlie. "What are these?" He pointed to the giant paw prints. One. Two. Three. Four. Five. Near the corpses. In the Queets Valley. In Neah Bay. And one more in his backyard. "It's like a bow," he said. "Like a bow and arrow. Here's the arrowhead," he said, pointing at his yard, "and here's the archer, pulling it back." There was no paw print to represent the archer. Bella—and Harry—watched as Charlie set his finger on La Push. "It's coming from here."

The blood drained from Harry's face.

Charlie kept his finger on the map and looked at his friend. His oldest friend.

"I can't," said Harry.

"I'm going to find out. Why don't you just tell me?"

The lines in Harry's face were deepest along the folds of his cheeks, from his nose to the corners of his mouth. His expression seemed to fall, and Bella saw him, really saw him, as not just a guy who hung around with her father, but as a guy with a family of his own. With a mortgage. With two teenage kids and an overworked, anxious wife. With a boat that wasn't quite paying for itself from the fees he earned as a fishing guide. The outer corners of his eyes turned downward, too, making him look older than what she figured he was: only forty-one or forty-two. Had he always looked so gray? Or was this something that had happened to him in the past year? He looked at the map and his spirit seemed to sag, deflated, and he leaned backward slightly, as if retreating inside himself.

"Is this a Quileute thing?" said Charlie. "I wouldn't understand?"

Harry was silent.

"Or is this a 'beyond my jurisdiction' thing? Because people are getting killed in my jurisdiction. I'm supposed to protect people. I swore an oath."

"So did I." Harry sighed and looked out the window. His eyes were wet. "I swore an oath. A very serious agreement that's been in place for almost seventy— for a long time."

"What?" said Charlie, and Harry looked scared all of a sudden. "You _what?_ With those... things? What have they got on you? What kind of hold? What do you owe them?"

Bella got the idea that Harry had said more than he intended. "I'm trying to do the right thing here," he said. "But there are some things I just _can't_ tell you. For others' safety."

"Wait, _seventy years?"_ said Charlie. "How long have you known about these things?" He was getting angry now, Bella could tell. "What kind of 'agreement'? Who made this agreement?"

Harry shook his head, but he wouldn't say anything else.

"Harry, people are dying! Vam— I can't even say the _word._ Those things are killing people. And you made an agreement with them? Why? How does it benefit you? How does it benefit _them;_ as in, why would they make an agreement?"

"I can't tell you. I shouldn't even be here now." He started to get up.

"Seventy years? What the—"

"Please. Keep this quiet."

The very suggestion made Charlie red with anger. "Keep it quiet," he said with venomous sarcasm, "like you kept it quiet while my daughter was in danger? Like when that woman died last month? Or that man from Ohio, whose parents couldn't recognize what was left of him? Quiet like that? Keep it quiet like when Waylon died? Slashed to—" Here Charlie put his fist over his mouth; he said the name of his friend once more and made a choked sob. "Waylon."

Bella stared between the men, horrified. "Keeping it quiet" had been her choice, too. She put a hand tentatively on Charlie's shoulder as he hid his tears behind his forearm, scrubbing his flannel shirtsleeve over his eyes. Harry burst out crying again, and this was different than the weeping he'd done before; this was different than crying over regret, guilt, and fear. This was just plain pain. It was scary and weird to see two grown men crying like this. Unabashedly, unselfconsciously, openly grieving. It all seemed to come pouring out of them, months and months of bottled sorrow. It made her tear up, too. Bella hadn't realized that Harry also had loved Waylon.

She tried to remember him. He was in the back of her memories of Charlie's life from her earliest years. Waylon had been tall and thin—gaunt-looking, really—and he often wore a scruffy gray beard. His voice had been rough; he always smelled like cigarettes; she could remember him sitting on Charlie's porch swing, smoking out there instead of in the house, and she could remember him grinning like a salty old sailor in his drift boat. He'd smoke all day in the boat, then tuck the cigarette buts in a little box instead of tossing them in the river. She'd seen other fishermen do that, and Waylon would talk bad about them. He used to bring a little cooler with beer for himself and Charlie and grape Fanta soda for her. He'd give her cookies and potato chips and call her "Missy" when she rode in the bow all morning as he and Charlie pulled in a steelhead or two.

Harry put his hand over his chest and tried to take deep breaths. Bella thought he looked very odd. She stood up to get him a glass of water, which was the only thing she could think might be helpful. Charlie, though, looked more alarmed. He waved off the glass of water and held Harry's gaze, helping him breathe more slowly.

"Maybe you should get this checked out," said Charlie. He wiped his nose on a dishtowel. "Go to the doctor."

"No," said Harry. He took another deep breath. "Stress. Just stress."

When he could breathe easily again, he said he had to go home. Bella said goodbye in the kitchen, Charlie got up and walked him to the door, and she heard the rough pats of hands on shoulders: the sound, she figured, of two men disguising a hug by slapping each other. It was funny, she thought, how they could cry together but not physically comfort one another plainly. _Is this a man thing?_ Through the window, she watched Harry walk to his truck. Charlie didn't have to say that he'd be in touch, and Harry didn't have to say that he'd be thinking about their discussion later. His face said it. His shoulders said it. He climbed into the Suburban and backed it out of the driveway.

"How long do those things live?" said Charlie, still standing at the front door.

"What?"

"The vam— The _things._ Those things. How long do they live?"

"I don't know. Forever?"

"And they eat people."

"Edward ate deer."

"Oh. Doesn't that make him special, then?"

Bella resented his tone. "It makes me alive."

"Go clean your room."

"But I want lunch."

"Go clean your room!"

She grabbed a spoon and a jar of peanut butter and stalked upstairs. When she looked back she saw Charlie staring into the coat closet. After a long moment, he closed the door and lay down on the couch, where he pulled one of the afghans up over his shoulders, rolled onto his side, and closed his eyes.

* * *

She returned to school on Tuesday. In the cafeteria, Angela said, "What's up with your dad?"

Bella cringed. It was lunchtime; she and her friend were dining with Mike and Jessica. Bella wasn't sure if this was an improvement in their social situation or not. Jessica sat close to Mike and kept her head down, quiet for once, and he kept whispering with her in a way that made Bella feel like they'd rather be alone. But the one time she tried to give them some space, Mike insisted that she and Angela stay put. He had nudged Jessica into apologizing for what she'd said to Angela about Ben, and Angela told Bella later that she felt the apology was sincere, or at least satisfactory. So now here they were, one big happy gang. But Mike held the reins. _Play nice,_ was his subtle message to Jessica. His message to Bella and Angela seemed to be, _Sit here and let her be nice to you._ It would take Bella until the end of the week to realize that Mike's message to every other guy in the room was, _Look at me. Look at these ladies. That's right. These are MY ladies. Suckahz._

Bella would understand that on Friday. But here it was only Tuesday, and she wasn't surprised by Angela's question. Mike and Jessica had the same question. They chewed their pizza and looked at her.

"It's hard to explain," she began.

That morning, Charlie had escorted her to school in the cruiser. He let her drive her own truck, but only because he knew that being tailed by the cruiser was more embarrassing than actually having to ride in it. He rolled through the parking lot after her, red and blue lights flashing, occasionally using the siren to go, _whoop! whoop!_ or using the horn on his roof-mounted amplifier to make sharp, sudden, nasal-sounding blasts. It felt like being pulled over for speeding, or being part of the world's slowest car chase. He parked her in when she finally found a space in the seniors' lot, just for show. She tugged her backpack out of the cab, turned her back on him, and walked toward the building. As she walked, he rolled along beside her, red and blue lights still swirling.

"I'm kind of grounded," she said to her friends.

"Kind of?" said Mike. "What did you _do?_ "

Lies, lies, lies. She had told so many of them, mostly about Edward, that making up another one seemed exhausting. So she told a partial truth. "He found out about some stuff with Edward."

Jessica seemed very interested in this. "What stuff?"

"Stuff. Stuff he's mad about."

"Hmm," said Jessica. "What kind of stuff deserves a police escort?"

"And grounding," said Mike. "Like he wants to know where you are at all times. Is he picking you up?"

"Probably."

"Ooh. Sounds juicy." Jessica pursed her lips in a saucy smile. Her brown eyes were sparkling. Without Lauren at her side, she seemed less menacing, so Bella sat back in her chair and said, "Guess." Angela turned to frown at her, but Bella shrugged. This game, she thought, could be her goodwill gesture toward Jessica. If they were starting over, then playing along was easier.

"Sneaking out," said Jessica.

"Nope."

"Drinking."

"No."

Jessica shrugged. "Ecstasy?"

"No! Where do you get—"

"Lauren."

"No, I meant where do you get these ideas?"

"That's really dangerous, Jess," said Angela. "Like, really—"

"I wouldn't do it," Jessica said. "I value my brain." She tapped her chin with one finger in an exaggerated gesture of contemplation. "Hmm... Ooh, shoplifting!"

"No," said Bella. She was starting to have fun. "But it does start with S."

"Sneaking out."

"Already said that."

"Sneaking in."

Bella was silent.

"Ooh, sneaking in!" Jessica lit up. "You did not! When?"

"You what?" said Angela. "But I thought—"

"Not every night," said Bella.

"You mean _almost_ every night, then?" said Jessica. "How?"

"Window." Bella sat back and let that sink in. Strangely, it felt really good. Telling the truth. Who knew? Jessica was looking at her with a little crinkle in her brow and her head cocked slightly to one side, a sure sign of a social-ladder re-evaluation. _What would Leah do with this moment?_ thought Bella. _If this moment were a truck, Leah would kick the shit out of it._ So she said, with as much bad-ass bravado as she could project, "I let my boyfriend climb up the side of my house, partly on a tree, and sleep in my room pretty much every night for about six months."

 _You WHAT?_ mouthed Angela.

Bella shrugged.

"Wow." Mike laughed. Then he made a weird growly sound like a tiger.

"Stop it," said Bella. "You're gross."

"Wait," said Angela. She looked suddenly small and hurt. "I thought you said nothing happened with him."

"Well, it didn't." Bella elbowed Angela to try to lighten the mood. "Nothing happened. It was all very..."

"Wrong?" said Mike.

"Shut up." Bella kicked him under the table. "It was kind of... pure?"

"Purely weird and obsessive?" said Mike.

Bella frowned at him.

"Sorry." Mike sat back in his chair. "I'm really sorry. That came out wrong. But honestly, he was... It was weird, Bella. He was really weird, and you acted weird, and we never saw you. I'm glad he's gone."

Angela murmured an agreement, and Bella could only grimace. The end-of-lunch bell rang and students started to pack up.

"Go back to the window part," said Jessica. "Up the side of your house. A tree. Every night—"

"Not every night."

"—and _nothing happened?_ "

"Nope. Not really. We would just talk, or kind of... cuddle, and then..." _And then we fell in love._... "Never mind." Bella put the last bits of her sandwich into her paper bag and wadded it up. As she left the room with Angela, she could hear Jessica already buzzing about it with Lauren, who glanced at Bella with cautious curiosity.

"Look at that," said Angela, following her into the hall. "Now you're cool again."

"Was I ever cool?"

"Nothing happened?"

Bella pushed open the door of the girls' locker room with her shoulder, and they found a bench where they could change into their required green shorts and white T-shirts. Gym class this month was like a referendum on badminton. Bella sliced air, over and over, with her racquet, and each time the birdie dropped in front of her, or whizzed past her ear, she'd stand glumly still for a moment and look at Coach Clapp. Her posture was like voting no, but the referendum never passed. Angela, fortunately, was good at this. Her height helped. She could leap and reach much farther than Bella, farther than most of the boys, and best of all, she _loved_ badminton. She was very fast, and kind of scary, thought Bella. They were partners, and she'd salvaged their position in the class tournament many times. This week, they were in fourth place. Angela tied her white tennis shoes and tried to spin and balance her racquet on her fingertip. It clattered to the floor. She picked it up and sat quietly on the bench beside Bella.

"Nothing happened," Bella said. She knew Angela was still thinking about it. "Nothing happened. I used to wish it had, but now— You know."

Angela smiled. Bella did, too, and then they both looked at the floor and blushed. _We're in the same boat_ , thought Bella. _And I'm glad._ But now what about Jacob? What would happen with him? Would he want... Or she... ?

She shook her head to clear it. Way too much stuff to worry about. Her brain was still reeling from the "Oh, my God, I kissed Jacob" realization and she couldn't imagine anything else. It made her cheeks go redder.

Angela guessed the reason. "How's Jake?"

Bella had to admit that she still hadn't heard from him.

"People with mono can talk on the phone."

"I sent him a card."

Angela said that was sweet of her, but that people with mono could talk on the phone, and they passed through the locker room into the gym. Most of the other students were already lined up in front of the bleachers for attendance and today's match assignments. The girls were paired up with Mike and the curly red-haired guy from Bella's _Wuthering Heights_ project.

"Oh, no," said Angela. "You have to help me today."

"If you hadn't noticed, I totally suck at this."

"No, help me focus. He's so cute, I can't stand it."

"What? Mike?"

"No. Cody. Oh, my God, I said his name. He's coming. Shhh!"

Mike's partner moved behind the net, his shoes squeaking on the varnished pine floor as he bounced and chased a birdie on his racquet like a chef flipping an egg in a frying pan. Bella looked him over. Cody, cute? He had dark brown eyes, rather unusual for a red-haired person, she thought, and pink spots on his jaw from apparently less than stellar shaving. His clothes fit him loosely, his Adam's apple was _very_ noticeable, and he was capable of earning a C on a good day in English class. His feet looked too long and he had fuzzy red hair on his calves. As they approached, he lobbed the birdie at Mike and crossed his arms, looking severely at the girls.

"Prepare for your DOOOOOOM!" he said in a exaggeratedly deep voice.

Bella rolled her eyes.

"You're going down," said Angela. "Down like— Way down, crash down, like—"

"We're going to win," said Bella flatly, hooking an arm through Angela's elbow and towing her from the net. "What about Quil?" she hissed.

"Yes, yes, he's cute, too."

"Are you talking about me?" said Mike.

"No!" said Angela over her shoulder.

"Yes," said Bella at the same time. Then, to Angela's pained expression, she hissed, "I was deflecting attention from _him."_

Cody was standing at the net now, looking vaguely uncomfortable.

"Shut up, shut up, shut up!" said Angela.

"Something is wrong with you," said Bella.

* * *

After school, Charlie was waiting for her in the parking lot, his white cruiser parked behind her truck. He was blocking other students' cars, too, but he appeared unconcerned, his window rolled down, his left elbow resting on the door frame and the fingertips of his right hand lightly tapping the steering wheel. He wore his black uniform, dark aviators, and a severe frown.

Bella slung her backpack into her truck's cab and stood in front of Charlie's window. "I have to go the pharmacy," she grumbled.

He didn't lower his shades. "Negative."

"It's for... lady reasons."

Charlie pressed the button to slide his window glass up and backed up so she could pull out in front of him. He tailed her noisy old truck out of the parking lot and up Main Street, where she parked in front of the Chinook Pharmacy and he parked her in again. As she slid down from the cab, she had to jump and clap her hands over her ears as the bullhorn on the cruiser's roof erupted with a whistle, crackling static, and her father's command to "Recon in five, copy copy."

She almost flicked her middle finger at him, and as if he could sense that, he depressed the button on the mic and scratched it over his badge. Amplified, it sounded like a jackhammer.

In the Chinook, she bought another get well card for Jacob. It had a photo of five wiener dogs wearing blue hospital scrubs on it, complete with stethoscopes and hair caps. On the inside, it said, "Five out of five DOCS-hunds hope you feel better soon." She was so pissed at Charlie that she couldn't tell if this card was funny or not. Would it make Jake smile? The card selection was limited, and other get well cards had pictures of limp butterflies. Not at all encouraging. She bought the dachshund card and a package of tampons, just in case Charlie wanted justification for the stop. The card, though, was private. She put it in her coat pocket as she left, though she rattled the blue box of tampons at Charlie's windshield. His expression remained severe and blank, but he did the scratchy thing with the microphone again and she put her hands over her ears.

Charlie didn't speak to her at home.

She went up to her room, which she had mostly righted after Sam's rampage. She still didn't know why he'd done that. And why had Edward hidden her things in the floor? _Gimme my stuff_ , she had said. Sam treated them like a bomb. She still wanted her stuff back, but she wasn't sure why. _Do I want do look at his picture? Not really. I'd cry. Do I want the plane tickets? I don't know..._ She felt confused. She lay on her bed and concentrated on something she felt _sure_ about: sending this card to Jacob.

" _Sorry for these dumb dogs."_ She wrote. _"Maybe they're funny? If they make you laugh, they're worth all of the $1.95 I spent on you."_

She stared at those words. Were they callous? Would he get the sarcasm? _"Sorry,"_ she wrote again. _"I was joking."_

She stared more. Did that sound like she was joking about wanting him to laugh?

" _Sorry. Not joking about your feeling better. Definitely feel better."_

Maybe, she thought, she should plan what she wanted to say. Otherwise she was going to wreck the card. She found her yellow notebook— _hateful journal that ruined my life—_ and tore out the page where she had written that vampires are real. She didn't want that to come anywhere near didn't even want the _word_ to be near a page with his name on it.

 _Dear Jake, I miss you,_ she wrote. Tears came to her eyes. She smudged the back of her hand across her nose and wrote, _I miss you and I don't know what's wrong. Mono? Come on, Jake. Please call me. Are you mad at me? Was it the hickey thing? I looked like a leopard, so if you..._ She felt embarrassed, writing the word hickey, so she scratched that part out and said, _Did I do something wrong? I'm sorry. Whatever it is, I'm sorry. I'm so sorry, Jake, I miss you. I miss you a lot._

She sat up and blew her nose on a tissue, and when she looked at her journal and the card, she saw that she'd written the word "sorry" six times. Why was she apologizing? For what? Why was she assuming he was mad? And why was she assuming that _she_ had messed it up somehow? Did she hate herself that much?

 _Shut up, Bella. Don't answer that._

For what felt like the millionth time, she told herself that he was simply too sick to go to the phone. It had only been eleven days. Mono lasted for weeks. And people with mono slept a lot. Like, a lot. Sometimes, she had heard, they slept all day.

Her heart ached. Imagining that Jake was too sick to call was just as bad as imagining that he was angry. She thought of him coughing, miserable, half-asleep in sweaty pajamas, trying to eat applesauce and ginger ale, then giving up and pulling his covers over his head. Maybe he had been nauseated and trembling with fever this whole time! _Poor Jake!_ Then she thought of him sweaty, miserable, feverish, and angry at her and _hurt._ Maybe he had found out about Edward. Not the vampire thing. But maybe he had found out about Edward coming to her room night after night. She didn't know how that could have happened, but maybe somehow it did.

 _There has to be some explanation..._

She found a pair of scissors in her desk and cut off a small lock of her hair, just about three inches, from the underside in the back. She had his beautiful, sleek black hair in her bedside table's drawer, which was admittedly a little weird, but in the novels she liked, it would have been okay. A hundred and fifty years ago, it would have been common, actually, for people to exchange locks of hair when someone was going to war, or going overseas... _or dying_ , she thought, and then she pushed that idea from her mind. The point was that it was a normal gift in the past, and somehow it seemed romantic to send him the little snippet of dark brown hair now curled in a gentle C shape on the card.

She almost wrote, _Hair's looking at you, kid_ on the card but cringed and stopped herself. Why was it suddenly so hard to know what to say to him? That night on the porch had rearranged their relationship, and she was a little lost. She finally just said, _I miss you,_ folded the lock of hair inside, and slipped it into the envelope.

 _There just HAS to be some explanation,_ she continued in her journal. _People with mono can talk on the phone. We didn't have an argument. Quil talked to him on the phone. Quil said he sounded "weird." What's going on?_ She glanced at her guitar in the corner. She hadn't played it in more than a week. But maybe she should give it a try. Maybe it would help her feel better. She doodled in her notebook until she had drafted a song, and she wrote it as a three-quarter time waltz.

* * *

Why haven't you called me?

How sick can you be?

Could your phone line be faulty?

Were you swarmed by some bees?

Are you lying there miserable?

Is this problem even fixable?

Oh, Jacob. Why am I singing this song?

Oh, Jacob. Tell me what has gone wrong.

* * *

Why haven't you called me?

Can I bring you hot tea?

Can you get well any faster?

Was there a natural disaster?

An avalanche? A hurricane?

Your silence makes me insane.

Oh, Jacob. Why am I singing this song?

Oh, Jacob. Tell me what has gone wrong.

* * *

Last time I saw you,

We were happy, so glad.

But maybe you're grounded,

Did you anger your dad?

My dad is pissed, too,

but not pissed at you,

so Jacob, why am I singing this song?

Oh, Jacob. Tell me what has gone wrong.

* * *

When we said goodbye last,

Your brother was crying.

He said, "Come night hiking,"

but maybe he was lying.

Why did you go out there?

In the woods there's a vampire—

* * *

Suddenly, she felt cold all over and couldn't finish her song. Why had Embry taken him into the woods late at night? Why had Embry acknowledged that there wasn't a bear out there, but something else? Did Embry know what it really was? How?

 _Don't say it,_ he had begged her. _And I won't have to say it either._

Moreover, she thought, reviewing that night, why did Sam and Paul force Embry into doing it? What had Paul meant when he said "thirty-two separate bags" and stood in front of Sam like he was protecting him?

Maybe, she thought, Jacob hadn't called because of something _she_ had done wrong. Maybe he hadn't called because something was wrong with _him._ She hadn't licked the envelope yet. Hastily, she scribbled on the inside flap, _Are you okay?_ , sealed it, and went downstairs for a stamp.

In the kitchen, Charlie was cleaning his Winchester rifle. He had it disassembled on a green felt mat on the table—the long steel barrel, the wooden butt, the hammer and trigger, the front sight, and a lot of other tiny things she didn't know the names for—and was polishing the barrel with a tan, suede cloth. As unobtrusively as she could, she slipped past the kitchen's arched entry. Charlie didn't say anything as she located some stamps in a drawer of an end table, but when she opened the front door, she heard his chair scrape across the floor and he appeared at her elbow with a where-do-you-think-you're-going kind of frown.

"Mailbox," she grumbled.

He stared at her as she went down the steps to the front walk and slipped the card into the mailbox. Very, very slowly, glaring back at him, she raised the plastic red flag on the side.

* * *

On Wednesday morning, she really didn't feel like getting out of bed. Charlie didn't like her _attitude_ ; he'd told her this repeatedly during dinner last night and had tried to impress upon her the very serious nature of her decisions.

"Let's just pretend that Edward is a grenade," he had said over spaghetti and meatballs while Bella twirled her pasta around and around on her fork. "You're dating a grenade. You bring the grenade to my house. Almost every day, it seems. You know god damn well that it's a grenade, but you like to take the pin out and go to the prom with it."

She frowned at her plate.

"Oh, and guess what? He has a family. Seven grenades! Why not hang out with them on weekends? What was your plan, Bella? Your plan for when this blew up?"

"Nothing was going to blow up. They were all very self-disciplined."

"Grenades blow shit up, Bella. Is that why— That time in Phoenix, your broken leg?"

"Not his fault."

"Then what? Who's fault was that?"

"It's a long story, okay?" She tossed her fork onto her plate, wishing she could get out of this conversation. "You don't really need to know all that; it'll just make you mad, and there's nothing anyone can do about it."

"Enlighten me."

He wouldn't let up, so she told him the story about James and his tracking abilities, and how the Cullens might actually deserve some of his thanks for leading James away from Forks.

"You think I should _thank_ them?" Charlie had his head cocked to one side, like he was examining some incomprehensible, alien being instead of his daughter. " _Thank_ them?"

Bella pushed her plate aside. She had hoped they were done with this sort of thing after that miserable Monday morning with Harry, but no, Charlie still had plenty of questions—and plenty of criticism—for her. "I resent your judgement," she said to him at one point, but that comment only served to release an avalanche of incredulity from Charlie about her own judgement.

"I resent _your_ judgement! I do not _trust_ your judgement! How can I trust you to take care of yourself? To make good decisions?"

She tried to point out that she made good decisions about nearly everything else in life: she did her homework, she showed up for her job, she didn't drink or use drugs or sneak out of the house—

"Those are givens, Bella. I'm not going to hand you an award for doing what you ought to do."

"But I could do worse. I totally could."

"And you _did._ "

It was no use trying to defend herself. She glared at her plate while Charlie delivered another what-were-you-thinking lecture. It had ended up taking all evening, and now here it was Wednesday morning and she hadn't done her homework.

Miserably, she rolled out of bed, crossed the hall, dropped her nightgown on the green mat in the bathroom, and turned on the shower. As the water heated up, she thought about Angela. Angela was acting really weird. _Cody? Seriously? That guy?_ She remembered the way he'd made her and Angela feel welcome at his lunch table with his basketball team friends after she helped their group with the _Wuthering Heights_ presentation. _This is Bella,_ he had said in introduction. _She's our nerd._ And Brandon had added, _Best nerd ever._ So okay, Cody was a nice person. But geez, like Quil, he seemed very different from Angela.

Downstairs, dressed in jeans and a sweater, she fixed herself a bowl of cereal and dialed Jacob's number. It just rang and rang, so she hung up and ate breakfast. Charlie came downstairs and made a phone call, too, connecting only with an answering machine: "Sam, you need to come in to work today or I'm going to have to let you go. You've missed two shifts in a row with no communication." A similar message was left at Paul Lahote's house. Charlie ate a bowl of cereal, too, and then escorted Bella to school in the same humiliating fashion as yesterday. After he drove off, she sat in her truck and tried to scramble through some Spanish homework that she hadn't done last night. She felt utterly exhausted. _Estoy muy cansado._ _El burro sabe mas que mi._ _Sonriendo._

* * *

On Wednesday night, Charlie wanted to talk about vampires some more. They sat at the kitchen table till almost nine o'clock like this, their dinner mostly untouched, the sun going down on the forest behind the house. Down the block, a streetlight blinked on, and rain began to patter softly on the roof. Charlie got up at one point and told her to clear the table. After she'd taken their dishes to the sink, she tried to slip away to her room, but her father said, "Oh, no-no-no-no-no-no..." and she slumped back into her chair, put her elbows on the table, and dropped her head, shoving her hands through her hair. Charlie got a pen, a yellow legal pad, and a cold white can of Rainier and sat down across from her. Leaning back in his chair and putting his feet up on the seat of the chair at the foot of the table, he scratched a question into the notebook, which he read to her: "How long would you say you've been acquainted with the Cullens?"

She raised an eyebrow at him. "I don't have to answer any questions without my lawyer present."

"Your father won't pay for a lawyer."

"Fine." She sighed, still holding her head in her hands, looking at the table. "About a year."

As the evening passed, she thought that maybe it was better like this. Play-acting. Charlie in his role as an examiner, an information-gatherer, and she as a suspect called in for questioning. He did his best not to be emotional, and she tried to be forthcoming. In a way, it felt like she had someone on her side, someone to whom she could unburden herself of these painful, heavy secrets.

"How many in that family?"

"Seven."

"How many ate deer?"

"Seven."

"Edward killed someone? You said in your notebook—"

"Yes. A long time ago. Many people, actually."

Charlie did his best to remain composed. "Who? Why?"

"Bad people. Or people he thought had done bad things. He listened to their thoughts—"

"Listened to their thoughts?"

"Like magic? Like a special ability." _Gosh, it DOES sound crazy to say this stuff out loud._ "He can hear people thinking. He would hear them think about terrible crimes, stuff they'd gotten away with, and then he'd eat them. It seemed... justifiable to him."

"Do all vampires hear people thinking?"

"No."

"Did he hear you thinking? Me thinking?"

"No. That's why he liked me. He said it was a relief not to have another person's thoughts filling up his head all the time. It tortured him, really."

"Poor thing."

"Shut up." She folded her arms and lay her head on the table. "He couldn't hear me. Said my mind was like a wall. And yours, too. Very intriguing. But you were half-permeable; he could catch a few words, and definitely emotions."

"So he knew I didn't like him."

"Yep."

Charlie wrote this down. "Go back to the magic powers part." He wrote this down, too, and she could hear him muttering about how he couldn't believe he was going along with this. "Does he have any other magic powers? Like flying? Disappearing?"

"No. But he's super fast. They all are. They run like, a million miles per hour. They drive fast. Ridiculous reflexes. Amplified senses. Smell like a bloodhound. Hear people breathing inside of buildings. See for miles. Very strong. Like, uprooting trees." She sighed. "They have almost no weaknesses."

"The species, you mean?"

"Species. Sure."

"Weaknesses?"

"Other vampires. That's it. To kill one, you have to rip it into pieces—well, a _vampire_ has to rip it into pieces—and set it on fire; otherwise they can put themselves back together."

"No predators? No diseases to harm them? No burning up in the sun."

"Nope. They actually sparkle in the sun. Like they're made of pale granite."

"Like your hand."

She nodded, and he asked to see it. He turned her palm up and looked at it under the kitchen light.

"Looks normal to me. No sparkle, but yes, very hard, very much like granite. Or marble."

"It would sparkle outside. I keep it in my pocket on sunny days."

"Oh, Bella."

She told him how Alice could predict parts of the future, the arresting visions she had at unpredictable moments, and how Jasper could manipulate others' emotions, riding waves of energy and soothing them, exciting them, or dampening anger. He, too, she said, was tortured by the thoughts of others, and he usually used his power to calm people.

"To sedate them."

"Sounds like a drug when you say it that way. More like he was helping them."

Charlie wasn't so sure. "To sedate them and eat them," he said.

"Well, no, Jasper only—" She stopped.

"Where and when did that one eat people?"

"Somewhere in the midwest, about half a century ago? Some lady doing her laundry. She smelled so delicious he couldn't stand it."

"You really seem to think these things deserve compassion."

"Well, I—"

"I'm just making a statement. Why do you think this?"

"Because they're people? They used to be people? They're mostly people? They're like, super-people? I don't know." She suddenly felt frustrated with herself. Why was this so hard to explain? "They try to be good people. Carlisle helps a lot of people."

"That one intrigues me."

"He's a minister's son. Believes killing is wrong. Discovered he could eat deer. Been doing that for four hundred years, along with being a doctor."

"Lots of blood in a doctor's job. How does that make sense?"

"His special ability is having will power."

"Something he tried to give his son."

"What?"

"So he wouldn't eat you. He tried to teach his son to abstain."

Wow. Charlie was scary smart, sometimes. He put down his pencil and leveled her with a hard stare, and she felt her spirit backing away from him.

"That's what it was. Will power. You gave him peace for his mind and a challenge for his will."

Hearing her love reduced to this sort of head game frightened her. She could feel a wall going up in her heart. "It wasn't—" she began, but tears welled up in her eyes. Billy had said the same thing. He'd said that Edward was congratulating himself, proud of his restraint. He'd said he spoke often with Carlisle, and this was a game Edward played. Something he enjoyed. "He loved me," she said, but her voice sounded small and lost.

"Did you love him?"

"Yes."

"Why?"

"Well, he— He loved me. He said I was beautiful, and that I smelled good—"

"Oh, God, Bella. Like the lady with her laundry, that good?"

"Yes," she admitted. "I'm his singer. My blood, it calls him."

"For the love of—"

"He loved me, and he _didn't_ eat me, he didn't. He fought with himself every day."

"Yes, but you loved him because...?"

"Because he loved me."

Charlie raised an eyebrow at her.

"And he was very interesting. I mean, I thought about him all the time."

Her father sighed. "You better just tell me everything, Bella. Go ahead and incriminate yourself all at once and get it over with."

So she told him—with a relief that felt as terribly therapeutic as Quil scrubbing dirt out of her road-rashy wounded leg—that Edward would climb into her room and watch her sleeping, and that after a while, he would lie beside her and watch her sleep more, and that she liked this, she really did. He would tell her all kinds of nice things. "But we didn't have sex." She hoped this would be a point in her favor. "We barely kissed. Otherwise—" No, she realized, watching Charlie's face go pale, this was not a point in her favor. He was already thinking about the "otherwise" consequence of kissing. But bravely, she continued, admitting that he spent most nights in their house, right under her father's nose, and Charlie didn't think this was nearly as cool as Jessica thought it was. She also admitted that the Cullens had left town after a mishap at her birthday party involving a paper cut and Jasper—"Edward saved me from that, too," she said, which she hoped again would win favor with Charlie—but it didn't—and she admitted that she had run into the forest after Edward when he broke up with her, thinking that she could run away with him.

"Run away with him? Bella—"

"I just wanted to be with him. I wanted to be with him all the time."

Charlie seemed to understand what "all the time" meant. He added it up before she realized that she had slipped. _That_ fact wasn't something she had intended to come clean about. "Bella, no," he said.

Tears came to her eyes again.

"You wanted to die?"

"Change? They can change you. It takes a few days, and it's very painful, but—"

"Oh, Bella, no. My baby girl." He wiped a hand across his eyes and put aside his paper. "No, no, no. Didn't you think we loved you? Didn't you think how that would break my heart? Your mother?"

He got up and walked into the living room. From a bookshelf beside his recliner, he lifted an album bound in green vinyl. It wasn't anything fancy. Inside it, at the kitchen table, he showed her photographs of her birth. Renee wearing a hospital gown printed with ducks, with sweaty hair, bags under her eyes, and a huge grin. Charlie looking so young, so fresh and giddy. The two of them sharing a kiss. A bright pink baby swaddled in a white blanket with a white cap on her head. Her open mouth and dark eyes. "Our Isabella," Charlie had written under the photo. She knew his handwriting. "Day 1." There were many more pictures of her. First bath. First bottle. Even a photo of her nursing at Renee's breast, and the serenity, joy, and peace in her mother's eyes was like nothing she'd seen before. Her first smile. Her first dress. It was September, and they'd dressed her in a teeny tiny green corduroy jumper. Charlie held her cradled with her head in the crook of his elbow. There were photos from her first Thanksgiving; she recognized her grandparents' house in Forks, their oval dining table and long yellow curtains. Her grandmother held her on her lap at the head of the table, this time in a white pajama-like suit printed with autumn leaves and a cartoonish squirrel. Her grandmother had dark brown hair in the photo—in Bella's memories, she could only recall her with white hair—and Bella herself, as a baby, had begun to grow dark brown hair as well; someone had tied a white ribbon around a tiny tuft.

There was a picture of her grandfather reading her a story. She couldn't remember him at all, but in the photo he was tall and thin like Charlie, with close-cut gray hair, leathery cheeks, and bony, knobby knees sticking out from his shorts as he read to Bella in a lawn chair. It was spring in the photo. She was six months old. She wore a pink dress and had pudgy bare feet, and she clutched a toy lamb. Charlie told her now that it was her Easter present. She was leaning against her grandfather's chest, and the book was called _I Am a Bunny._

In other photos, she was crawling. Tasting Cheerios. Scooting around on the porch on a wheeled, plastic lion. Renee brushed her hair. Renee changed her diapers and made faces as if the diapers were stinky, but it was obvious that she was just pretending and trying not to laugh. There were photos of her in the bathtub, holding a handful of foamy bubbles and staring at it, mesmerized. By the time she was two, the photos changed. She saw herself with two little pigtails tied with red, puffy yarn; a pair of big, dark, solemn eyes; small, well-defined lips that didn't smile; and a stiff way of holding her Easter lamb, now dingy yellow.

"We were splitting up by then," said Charlie. "We didn't want you to know. Maybe you did know. And then I came home from work one day and Renee was gone. You were gone. You can't know how—"

He didn't finish that sentence. He went upstairs and closed the door of his room. It was only nine-thirty. Bella took the photo album to her own room. She knew she should do some homework, but she just lay on her bed and looked at the pictures while tears rolled down her face. She thought once or twice that she heard a small sound from Charlie's room. She got ready for bed, and at eleven o'clock, when she was still hearing those sounds, she knocked on his door.

"Charlie? Dad?"

He came out and sat on the floor in the hall with her. His eyes were red. He turned the pages of the album. Most of the photos of her two-year-old self had those same solemn eyes. Page after page. "I feel sometimes," said Charlie, "like we did this to you. Made you so serious. Made you so quiet."

She didn't know what to say to that, except the thing Jacob always said to her: "It's okay." Whatever it was, Jacob said this, and it usually helped.

"Not really," said Charlie. "Did we make you want to leave us? Did we fuck up that bad?"

She stared at the photos. When she had been in love with Edward, running through the green cedars, changing to be with him forever felt like love, felt like a thrill, felt like a future that fit with what she'd always wanted to be. But she thought now that she didn't know what she'd always wanted to be. She didn't know. And to her father, those cedars would have been a vanishing place. He'd have thought she died. Now, knowing the truth about Edward, she could see that he believed she had _wanted_ to die.

"No, you didn't mess it up," she said. "No. I just— I don't know. I don't know." She felt exhausted. "I kept thinking, 'Why would he love me? I'm nobody.' But he did. He said he did. He took me to the top of a pine tree. I saw the ocean and the mountains. He paid a lot of attention to me. I felt happy. I think. Now I don't know."

"Don't you ever leave us."

She knew what he meant.

"Please, Bella. Do you think you need a doctor? Like a counselor? Or some medicine? Prozac?"

"I don't know."

They sat in the hall a while longer. He told her about his father. He'd been kind of down in the dumps for many years. Maybe this ran in families.

"I thought it was cancer."

"Okay, cancer makes people depressed. Yeah."

"I'm sorry," she said.

"Me, too," said Charlie.

He said a lot of other things that pained Bella to remember as she lay in bed on Thursday morning. Things about how he'd go to the ends of the earth for her. Things that made her feel like Charlie ought to get a life beyond caring so crazy much about her. Then she wondered if this thought came from the same rotten place that made her wonder why Edward cared, too. Couldn't she just accept the fact that her father loved her? Couldn't she just accept that?

It was hard. If she accepted it that deeply, it meant she'd have to do something about it. Honor it. Honor herself. She rolled out of bed and tried to turn her mind toward other matters, such as Angela's weird crushes, matters that had seemed huge yesterday but which now paled in the face of the mystery of caring about herself.

* * *

It was that afternoon, sitting in Mrs. Kranz's history class, that the events of the past week began to add up.

The light was silvery gray. She sat near a window, looking out on the parking lot. Beside her, Angela was taking notes on the Korean War and chewing on the end of one long lock of brown hair. She had a bruise on her forearm from tripping in gym class and falling on her racquet. The girls had been paired _again_ with Cody and Mike for the tournament because yesterday Angela had zipped all over the court, swatting everything Bella missed, and had managed to tie three out of three games. In today's rematch, Cody said something complimentary to her and she fell down. On the other side of Angela, Mike was taking notes, too, but every now and then he'd glance at Angela, or Bella, with a look that said _What the fuck happened back there?_ but neither girl would meet his eye. Jessica sat on Mike's other side, acting more like her studious self than she had in months, and in the back corner, Tyler Crowley was massaging Lauren's shoulders, but Bella didn't care about any of that. She was looking out the window at the gray light and the gray parking lot, and her mind began to assemble the pieces to the puzzle that was Jacob's silence.

1\. Jacob was happy the last time they were together. Very happy.

2\. Sam made Embry take Jacob into the woods, and Embry knew there was something worse than a bear out there.

3\. Billy said Jake had mono, but she had googled the symptoms of mono and Angela was right; a phone call was certainly possible.

4\. Harry was unable to answer all of Charlie's questions because of some vow he had taken, a oath, an allegiance to an agreement seventy years old. What? What was that?

5\. Charlie's map showed a bow-shaped arc of vampire attacks and large animal prints around Forks, and the arrow was the print in their backyard. The archer, meanwhile, was not evident yet, but it seemed to be in La Push. Harry had looked very uncomfortable with this suggestion, so she suspected Charlie had hit his mark.

6\. Something happening in La Push had even Harry's lips sealed, and the only person powerful enough to boss him around was Billy.

7\. Archers control arrows.

8\. Therefore, Billy was the evil mastermind behind whatever shady business was happening in La Push.

She gasped audibly and put her hand over her mouth. Mrs. Kranz stopped talking and looked at her, so Bella ducked her head and pretended to read her textbook.

Billy! She should have known. He knew all the secrets, probably more than _she_ did, and he was keeping his son away from her. Maybe he thought she was connected with or condoning these recent vampires attacks! This was simply unacceptable. Today, as soon as the final bell rang, she would drive out to La Push and give him a piece of her mind.

 _Jacob, I'm coming!_

Unfortunately, when the final bell rang, Charlie was waiting in the parking lot in the cruiser to escort her home. She parked her red truck beside her mailbox as the cruiser idled in the street behind her and sulkily climbed the porch steps. Then, to her relief, Charlie rolled down his window and said he had to go back to the station. "I'll be home at six o'clock," he said. "Do your stinking homework and start dinner. I got enchiladas in the freezer; they'll need about an hour in the oven."

Of course she said she would do that. She went inside and shut the door. Then she took the enchiladas out of the freezer and left them to thaw on the kitchen counter.

It was half past three. It took half an hour to drive to La Push, and half an hour on the way back. That left... ninety minutes to figure out what was happening with Jacob and tell Billy to shove off. She locked the front door behind her, started her engine, and headed for the La Push Road in her old red truck.

* * *

 _Thank you for reading! I hope you'll review. Sorry I haven't written individual thank you notes AGAIN after the last chapter. I do appreciate every single one of your messages. I treasure them. Thank you all._

 _Questions:_

 _1\. What do you think of Charlie's response to all the information he's been getting about vampires?_

 _2\. What do you think about Harry's attempt to do the right thing? IS he doing the right thing? Too much? Not enough? Can you forgive him for his silence in the past?_

 _3\. What would you say now about Bella's accepting or not accepting responsibility for her choices?_

 _4\. What should I do with Angela and her crush(es)?_

 _5\. Are you ready to see Jacob again?! He'll reappear soon!_

 _Thank you again! Please write to me! I'll try harder to get back to you. I have had to step down from my job (long story involving no dishonor) because I moved to a new town far enough away that I couldn't commute. Bummer. I miss my job, but now I have more time for writing, so that's okay. :-)_

 _Oh, and I think I can finally promise again: Previews to Reviewers!_


	5. Chapter 5 Search Party

_Author's note: This is my longest chapter yet, in either of my stories! You are going to need a bottle of water, a blankie, some freeze dried food (camping food is acceptable), a backpack, and about a half hour of time for YOU. I hope you enjoy it._

* * *

 **Chapter Five**

 **"** **Search Party"**

Charlie hadn't exactly _said_ the three little words that were buzzing in Bella's brain as she sped toward La Push on the 110 spur, late Thursday afternoon. It was a silvery gray kind of day. Perfect for a vampire, she thought. A perfect day for a Cullen to parade around town without sparkling, pretending to breathe and blink and be normal. It was also a perfect day to ignore the heap of trouble she was in for having a relationship with a certain sparkly boy, so that she could concentrate on saving her relationship with a certain _other_ boy, a refreshingly, honestly, and truly _normal_ human boy. It was a perfect day to rescue her best friend—now her boyfriend!—from whatever shady business Billy had tangled him up in. She wasn't sure what was happening, but she suspected it was Billy's fault.

 _Jacob, I'm almost there!_

It was a perfect day for speeding to La Push to kick some Quileute Chief ass...ociated wrongdoer's backside. _Yeah. That's what I'll do._ And it was a perfect day to ignore the fact that while Charlie hadn't actually said those three little words, he didn't have to. Bella knew very well that saying YOU ARE GROUNDED was a pale formality of a pebble compared to the towering black mountain of shit she was in.

She drove on and on, between the clear-cut fields and the plantations of skinny, young, replacement pines. She drove past the patches of old forest that remained, and she drove past the little bridge that turned north to cross the Quillayute River. Jacob had taken her over that bridge just a couple weeks ago; she had been blindfolded and trusting, and he'd driven her to a meadow to look at stars. It was like receiving a bouquet of a million glittering, silver roses. _This is not a date,_ he had whispered to help her feel comfortable. Well, looking back now, she decided that it certainly _was_ a date. It was the most beautiful evening anyone had ever planned for her. And she would be darned if she'd let anything stand in the way of rescuing her best friend— _my boyfriend!_ —from this so-called "mono" that his father had concocted.

But when she arrived in La Push, she was almost afraid to turn into Billy's driveway. She paused for a moment in the road by his mailbox, but then she noticed another car in her rearview mirror coming along, so she got out of its way by turning slowly and moving up the gravel driveway. She stopped short of the end of it, however, because the Rabbit was parked there, at the edge of the grass.

The place seemed eerily quiet. There was no smoke coming from the wood stove's chimney on top of the house. Bella gave herself a pep talk, rolled her shoulders, and climbed down from the cab. Swinging the truck's door shut made a creak and bang that seemed extra loud in the stillness.

On the porch, there was a plastic bag full of kitchen trash. She knew Billy could empty the trash in the house, but it was Jacob's job to carry it to the garbage can near the garage. She stepped cautiously around it and knocked on the door. After waiting a moment, she knocked a second time, louder. When no one answered, she turned the doorknob, and the door swung slowly open.

"Hello?" she called. "Jake? Billy?"

 _Is this wrong?_ she wondered as she stepped over the threshold. _Is this trespassing? Spying?_ It definitely felt wrong. But nothing about this situation felt _right,_ so she closed the door behind her and flipped on a light. What she saw was stunning.

Dirty dishes on the table.

Mud gummed onto the carpet near the door, under the table, at the edge of the hall.

In the kitchen, she saw more dirty dishes beside the sink, and a few clean ones drying in a rack on the counter.

A box of cereal was on the counter—with the cardboard flaps at the top standing open.

Opening the refrigerator, she saw that it contained only two cans of Rainier, a half-empty gallon of milk, a block of cheddar cheese, the tail end of a loaf of bread, a limp head of broccoli, and a dozen or so condiments on the shelves behind the door, ketchup and salad dressing, stuff like that. The freezer, however, held an assortment of microwave meals. Billy's orange plastic extension grabber lay on the cupboard beside the fridge.

And the phone had been unplugged from the wall.

She had to lean against the counter and take a deep breath.

The living room looked fairly normal, except that there was only one log left where there was usually a small pile beside the stove, and the twins' room looked normal, too. It was just a place where the Blacks stored stuff, boxes and books and old curtains, leaving only Rachel's bed untouched for her visits. The bathroom, however, looked noticeably dirty, with toothpaste scummed in the sick and the towels smelling faintly of mildew.

What was going on here? Moving further down the hall, she paused outside of Jacob's room, took another deep breath, and opened the door.

Her heart sank. This room was the worst of all. A damp breeze blue through the open window. The glass was raised and the screen had been knocked out. Clothes were everywhere, some of them torn, and the bedsheets were on the floor, all of them. The wool Pendelton blanket, probably one of the nicer things in the house, had been flung in a corner, and the bare mattress seemed to radiate a _wrongness_ that was profoundly unsettling. She was almost afraid to approach it. Was this where Jacob had been lying sick? Where was he now? Was the mono real? Was he in the hospital? She ran her fingers over the smooth surface, noticing faint yellow stains near the edges, as if something had been spilled in the middle and the moisture seeped outward, discoloring the fabric. She had the horrible thought that it might be _urine._ Maybe Jake was really, really sick. Maybe he had been having feverish nightmares. Tears came to her eyes. Hesitantly, she bent her head and sniffed it. To her relief, it did not smell like urine; it smelled like perspiration. A lot of perspiration.

She sat down on the floor and leaned her back against the bed. Was this how Charlie felt sometimes? Trying to solve cases? She hoped she had inherited at least a little of his detective skills.

 _Fact:_ Jacob had been incommunicado for thirteen days.

 _Fact:_ Billy claimed he had mono.

 _Fact:_ Charlie thought there was something shady happening in La Push.

 _Fact:_ Harry confirmed the existence of vampires to Charlie, but he wouldn't share the details of an "agreement" he or someone else in the tribe had made with some vampire(s).

 _Fact:_ There were large unidentified animal paw prints connected with the vampire murders.

 _Fact:_ The last time she'd seen Jacob, Embry was taking him into the woods at night, and Embry seemed to know that the menace out there was not a bear. _Don't say it. And I won't have to say it either,_ he had pleaded.

Embry! Maybe he could help. But where did he live?

She stood up shakily and wiped away a tear. Seeing the teardrop on her finger made more tears come, and then she couldn't stop herself from crying as she moved around the room, making Jacob's bed again and picking up his clothes. She put the ones that looked clean into his dresser and the ones that looked dirty into the washing machine. While it churned and hummed, she went back to the kitchen, still shedding tears, and washed all the dishes. She cleared the dining table and washed those dishes, too, then she tucked the flaps of the cereal box closed and replaced it in a cupboard. Lastly, she cleaned the bathroom and put out fresh towels. It would be obvious to Billy that she had been there, sneaking around in his house—who else would compulsively clean things?—but she didn't care. She couldn't stand it. Out in the driveway she saw that the Rabbit's driver's side window had been left rolled down about two inches, and though its parking break was set, it hadn't been left in first gear. The neglect of his car felt worse than the house. She fixed those things, too, smudged away another tear, and tried to steel her nerves.

Quil would know where Embry lived. Now if only she could remember where _Quil_ lived...

* * *

A quick cruise toward the sea led her past a familiar-looking side street; she turned left, and after only half a block the scene fell into place. Moments later, she was driving up a low hill and parking in the gravel beside the Atearas' one story white house. There was a light in the kitchen window, but Joy's pink Fiesta was nowhere to be seen, thank goodness. When she knocked, Quil came to the door. He glanced left and right up the street, pulled her inside, and closed the door behind her.

"Where's Jake?" they said at the same time, and then they stood looking at one another, their shoulders sinking, as they saw their anxieties mirrored. "Shit," muttered Quil. He waved her into the kitchen and offered her a Twinkie.

"Yes, _please._ " She unwrapped it and slurped the cream out of the middle as delicately as possible while he snarfed down another in two bites.

Jake had been absent from school for almost two weeks, said Quil. He had telephoned him almost as often as Bella had—

"Their phone's off the wall," she supplied.

—and had only reached him once, last week, when he sounded "weird." Not like himself. Weird how, Bella wanted to know. He was weird emotionally, said Quil, and when Bella raised an eyebrow at him he said, "Yes, I know what that means," with a roll of his eyes. He was weird in that he sounded far away. Like his mind was somewhere else. And he abruptly said goodbye. Other than this truncated call, there had been no contact, though there _had_ been two sightings.

"Sightings?" said Bella. "What is he, a wild animal now?"

"I guess 'sightings' is a weird way to say it," acknowledged Quil. "But it makes me crazy. I'm trying to call him, trying to catch him at home, standing on his porch, yelling at his bedroom window. Teachers keep sending me over with homework, and I just have to leave it on the porch or in the mailbox. But nobody's picking up the mail."

"What?"

"Nobody's picking it up _regularly,_ at least. Not every day."

"Are they gone? Both of them? Like, a vacation?"

"Yeah, right," scoffed Quil, unwrapping another pair of Twinkies. "They're in Jamaica, right now."

Seriously, though, he said, they did seem to be gone a lot. Quil had only seen Jacob twice, walking down the road in the early morning before school. He seemed to be heading home. Quil had approached him once, but when he blinked, Jacob was gone. It was a very foggy morning, and he thought maybe he hadn't seen Jacob after all; maybe he'd just imagined he saw him because he was wishing so hard. Billy spent more time at the Atearas' house than at his own, having dinner with his grandfather most nights while Quil did his homework and tried to avoid them; they just yelled at him to go away and mind his own business. Then those two would take a kerosene lantern and walk-slash-roll over to his grandfather's garden patch at night.

"Gardening at night?"

"I followed them once. They were—" He crumpled up the Twinkie wrappers and jerked his head toward the door. "You gotta see this. Actually—" he paused to regard her skeptically "—you gotta tell me what the fuck this is."

"What's what?"

"Come on."

* * *

After a short drive, Bella parked her old truck under a stand of cedars at the end of a dirt road on a low hill at the east side of the village. Quil slid out of the passenger side and slammed the door. It was about half past four o'clock. A silvery mist blew up the hill, obscuring most of the houses below, and the low, thick cedar branches obscured the truck, so that as she walked away from it she could almost feel that she was lost in a far away time, before roads or cars or modern houses came here. The trees were perfectly still; the ground was silent, no twigs cracking underfoot, as she and Quil walked over a wide mossy path between the vegetable patches where a few moldy bean vines from last fall clung to a thin trellis and a bed of lettuce had erupted in a lush display. In another bed, carrots crowded together, their fronds taller than her knees, their orange shoulders beginning to thrust aside the soil. She couldn't help admiring them.

"If there's one thing we got, it's rain," said Quil. "Check out this cabbage."

"You could play basketball with that."

At the back of the garden was a small aluminum shed. She remembered that Quil had stashed the bikes there once. Now he spun the numbers on a combination lock and slid the metal door aside. Bella saw a few garden tools, a box of fertilizer on a shelf, a rusty yellow wheelbarrow, and a few scraps of paper seed envelopes. A piece at her feet said, "Cantaloupe." There was no electricity in the shed, so no light other than what came through the door, and the floor was damp particle board in danger of rot. In the center of the floor were a couple of folding chairs and a large plastic cooler, the kind with a lid and handles, big enough to hold a couple dozen bottles of drinks and a bag of grocery-store ice. There were seven or eight bricks piled on top.

"Grandpa spends a _lot_ of time in here lately. Billy, too. I followed them here once at like, eleven o'clock. What the fuck, right? I'm standing in the trees, waiting for the wind to quiet down, and then I hear them singing."

"Why would they be singing?"

"You think I know? They're singing old-time stuff, words nobody knows—except them, I guess—and they're drumming so, so, softly. Like they don't want to wake anybody up."

"Well, sure, if it was eleven o'clock then—"

"Whatever they're doing is not satisfying them because they keep coming back. At least, they keep leaving my house at night and I guess they keep coming here. That night I followed them, I got as close as I could, and I could figure out that it was a question song."

Bella looked up. The rafters of the shed were strung with unfamiliar instruments: round drums of wood and hide, mallets with feather-ties, a rattle made from a shell.

They were singing a question song, but Quil couldn't figure out any more than that because A) they got suspicious and called out, "Who's there?" even though he had been trying to make absolutely no sound as he snuck closer, and B) he didn't speak Quileute.

"You don't? I thought everybody learned it in school here."

"Not really. We learn stuff like, 'Good morning,' and 'That's a nice fish you got there.'"

"Come on. What about that speech Jake made, at his birthday party?" She could still see him standing on the hood of Harry's truck, talking to the crowd in his driveway. "He spoke for a long time. And everybody clapped for him."

"Yeah..." Quil sank into one of the folding chairs and nudged the other in her direction. "He knows enough to impress the elders. Like, 'Ooh, there goes our future chief, and he knows the traditions. He'll carry them on.'" Quil raised his hands in a Hallelujah gesture and squeaked, "'Our future is safe with him.'"

Bella was surprised by his cynicism and resented this depiction of Jacob. "It _is_ safe with him. He really cares! And he obviously knows a lot of the language."

"He knows shit. Here's his speech: 'Quileutes are great!' Crowd goes 'Yay.' 'La Push is great!' 'Yay.' 'Fish are great!' 'Yay.' 'Hooray for salmon!' 'Yay.'"

She frowned at him.

"Okay, it's not that bad. And he does know more than most people. Most young people. But honestly, we've got three fluent speakers left, including Grandpa, and it's sad. I don't want to talk about it. Except to say that we've got more words for fish than anything else _—_ or we've got more language lessons based around fish than anything else."

"You should get your grandpa to write some new lessons. Maybe about rain."

"Ha ha." With a black look, he leaned forward in his chair and began to remove the bricks on top of the cooler, one or two at a time. They looked heavy. Bella watched as he set them aside. Then she leaned forward in her chair, too, and they opened the lid.

The scent that hit her was strong enough to make her cough. Quil coughed, too, and his eyes watered. She felt a small tug in her gut, a slight sensation of seasickness, as she reached for the pink cotton pillowcase.

"Why do they stink so bad?" said Quil. "Bella? Say something."

Bella hadn't realized she was holding the photographs. How long had Quil been waiting for her response? She gazed at the images of Edward. They had been hidden beneath her bedroom floor all along? She looked again in the pillowcase and took out the plane tickets from the Cullens. "This is mine..." she said slowly.

"Yes, obviously. What's it doing here?"

"I don't know..."

"Did you give it to him? My grandpa?"

"No." She tipped her head to the side, looking at the photos of Edward with a strangely blank sensation. There she was, standing next to him, smiling, looking so young. So... unbroken. _Is that me?_

"Do you miss him?" said Quil.

"Huh?"

"You've been staring at that for like, five minutes."

"I have?"

"Gimme that."

"No."

"Give it." Quil forced her fingers apart, returned the things to the pillowcase, and replaced them in the cooler. "Help me with these rocks," he said, coughing again as he replaced the bricks, but she said she needed fresh air and stepped outside. Her stomach felt funny. She leaned against the side of the shed and looked up at the sky. Somewhere, the sun was burning behind all that mist.

* * *

Ten minutes later, Bella was trekking down the forested hill in front of the garden, walking with Quil through scratchy holly branches and pine needles slick with dampness. The hill was part of somebody's backyard, but it was a very large backyard and they couldn't see the house. Quil said it belonged to one of Billy's sisters, and she wouldn't care if they walked there. It was on the way to Embry's house.

After Quil had stacked the bricks on the cooler again, he had come outside and locked the shed's door. "I think I'm gonna puke," he said, leaning against the wall beside her.

She told him how she'd thought Edward had taken all those things when he left, and how shocked she was to learn that they'd been hidden beneath her bedroom floor. More shocking was the fact that Sam had discovered and stolen them. Quil deduced that Sam had given them to his grandfather. Why? He knew that Sam and Billy had some kind of weird connection, and now it seemed his grandpa was pulled into that circle.

"Sam, Billy, Emb, Paul, Jared, and now my grandpa. Maybe now Jake," said Quil. "This is really bad."

Jake hated Sam. Quil hadn't exactly _seen_ Jake with Sam, but the fact that he'd been sick and out of touch for so long mirrored what had happened to Embry. Embry was sick, absent for two weeks, and then he was Sam's new bitch.

"That's sexist," Bella said, but she wasn't sure why. She felt queasy, too. She wanted to open the shed and get her stuff, but at the same time she felt angry and scared and sad. Quil wouldn't let her open the door.

"Something's wrong with that shit. Plus I don't want them to know we've been here." He picked up a fallen branch from a cedar tree that still had the needles on it and brushed away their footprints.

"Very sneaky," she scoffed, pointing to her truck. "Notice the big red evidence over there."

"They only come at night." He had brushed away their footprints all the way to the edge of the garden and then they started down the hill. Now he helped her over a log covered in thick, spongy, lime green mosses and pale lichens. He listened as Bella described the last time she'd seen Jacob: after the movies, nearly two weeks ago, when Sam and Paul showed up at her house at midnight and made Embry take Jake into the woods.

"Maybe Embry was having a problem," she said. "Jake promised to help."

"Embry is having a problem called Sam," Quil retorted. "And he doesn't ask for help with anything. It's stupid, but that's how he is."

A raven burst out of the branches of a hemlock tree overhead, flapping its wide, black wings and giving a sharp, rattling call, and Quil jumped. Then he leaned against the trunk, trying to take deep breaths, closing his eyes and lifting his head. Bella thought he was trying not to cry.

"Hey..." she said. "It's okay."

"It's not," he panted. "Something really bad is happening. Something— Damn, Bella, what _is_ that shit up there? In the shed. What _is_ that?" His eyes were watering. He passed a hand over his face, then winced. "Smells so bad. I feel filthy. Feel like—" There were no words to describe it. He bent over and pushed his fingers into the soft loamy soil, scooping up a handful and rubbing it all over his hands.

"Are you washing with dirt?"

Quil made a hiccup of a laugh. Then he suddenly said, "I'm scared. I think I'm next."

She didn't know what to say. She could only give his hand a squeeze, and they descended the rest of the hill in silence, helping one another over the slippery tangles of roots and ferns. There was no trail, so they waded through the rustling, green underbrush as best they could. Sword fern. Bracken fern. The wide, waxy leaves of salal. White trillium. And stinging nettle, which Quil helped her identify and avoid. "Thanks, Nature Boy," she said. There were long passages where the terrain was smooth, but Quil didn't let go of her hand. When they came within sight of a gravel road at the bottom of the hill, he pulled her into a hug. She heard him sniffle and suspected he may have brushed his damp nose on her hair. But she put an arm around him and put her ear against his chest. His body was less soft now, she noticed, less pudgy, and his heart was beating fast. She felt a sinking in her own chest because Quil was the last person she'd have picked to get freaked out about something. It felt like confirmation of her fears.

"We've got to save him," she said. "Come on. We can do it."

"To the rescue," groaned Quil. "Ghosty White Girl and Nature Boy. Able to leap into ancient pick up trucks in a single bound. Faster than a speeding—"

"Cop car."

"I was gonna go with speeding turtle. Maybe banana slug."

"No, look, cop car."

From between the trees, they saw a black and white cruiser roll through an intersection at the end of the gravel road.

"It's my dad. Shit, shit, shit."

"So?"

"I'm supposed to be at home."

"Shit," said Quil, laughing now. They dashed across the gravel road and into another stand of trees. A trail led to the backyard of another one of Billy's relatives: his older son.

Embry's yard was long, narrow, and unmown. The soft, long green blades of grass shimmered in the light breeze. There were two iron posts sunk into cement anchors at either end of the yard; a clothesline ran between them. The top of the line was tinged green; it seemed like the kind of thing that would only be used in July, maybe August. A path of stepping stones led from the woods to the back porch, which was screened in and ran the whole width of the house. The house itself reminded Bella of a gingerbread cottage from a fairy tale, but weather-worn. It was small and brown, with a peaked roof and a little chimney. Seashells and strings of beach glass hung from the porch's eaves; they tinkled in the wind. In the flower garden below the porch and along the sides of the house, daffodils bloomed. They were one of the few flowers deer wouldn't eat, and they spread naturally. The Calls must have had a daffodil garden forever, thought Bella. The house was ringed with gold.

The yard and the little house were overshadowed by an enormous, hoary old cedar tree. The lowest branches had died long ago, losing their needles and the smaller twigs, leaving the tough, weathered bare branches to stretch over yard, the porch, and the driveway where the Calls' blue Toyota Tercel was parked. From those bare branches hung dozens of empty glass bottles. They were tied up with a variety of things—brown twine, fishing line, a shoestring, some red yarn—and the bottles caught the late afternoon light, glowing like strange fruit in shades of green, blue, amber, and watery pink.

"Emb's mom's kind of superstitious," said Quil.

Bella took a deep breath. "To the rescue," she muttered, stepping out from the trees. "Am I really 'Ghosty White?'"

"You're super pale, yeah. You eat much?"

She rolled her eyes. Maybe she ought to eat more pierogies, like Charlie wanted. Or Twinkies.

The screen door creaked as they stepped onto the porch. Shouldn't we go around to the front, asked Bella, but Quil said it didn't matter. He knocked, and after a moment Tiffany Call came to the door.

Embry's mother looked a lot like her son. She was tall and slender—perhaps too slender—with dark brown, wispy hair that was cut in a shaggy, soft style. She wore jeans and a stretched out green sweater that looked too big for her. "Come in," she said.

The porch door opened to the kitchen. Cupboards painted white with Swedish-looking scrollwork trim were nailed to the wall above a wide porcelain sink. The counter was chipped red formica that looked like it had been there since the 1940s, and there were no cupboards beneath the counter, only shelves kept from view by little curtains, white with cherries printed on them. "My mom made those," said Quil when he noticed her looking at them.

"Those are nice curtains," Bella said to Ms. Call. "I like your kitchen."

Her face remained impassive, and Bella thought maybe Ms. Call believed she was trying to suck up to her on first acquaintance.

"I like to cook," she explained. "I like looking at people's kitchens." This was mostly true.

"What do you like to cook?"

"Brownies. Also cookies and muffins. Sometimes lasagna."

She invited them to sit at the round wooden table in the center of the room. "You must be Jake's girlfriend."

Bella nodded, wondering if that explained some of Ms. Call's reserve.

"Embry talks about you. Says you haven't been feeling well for a long time."

 _Embry noticed that?_ "I'm doing better lately."

"He also says you destroyed Sam's truck."

Quil started to laugh, and Bella flushed. A slow, wicked smile spread over Tiffany Call's thin face, and she reached for a tin on the counter, took off the lid, and offered it to Bella. Brownies. Bella returned her smile sheepishly as she took one.

Tiffany wanted to know what Sam had done to her son, and where he disappeared to at all hours of the day and night. He sure wasn't here doing his homework, or talking to her, or reading, or doing anything else he used to enjoy. Quil sucked in a deep breath as he heard this. When he did come home he slept like the dead or ate like a trucker. He kept telling her that everything was fine and dodging her questions. She was considering calling the police, but she didn't want any social workers to get involved.

"You tell me where he's been. Who he's involved with. Is it pot? Meth? Steroids? What the hell kind of team is he going to join out here?"

"We don't know."

"He's not my boy. Not who he was." She looked out the window, blinking rapidly. "Just tell me what's happening. I'm not going to get angry; I won't tell your parents. I just need to know."

Bella's heart sank. Ms. Call knew less than she did. Quil apologized, and the three of them sat staring at the table cloth a moment longer. Then it seemed that it was time to leave. Quil stood up. He promised to find out. He'd let her know as soon as he had anything. Bella stood up, too, and Ms. Call walked them to the door.

"You call me if you need me," she said to Quil.

He hugged her, and Bella noticed her shoulders trembling. As they left, she came out, too, shrugging into a raincoat, and locked the door behind her. They saw her walk down the driveway with long, quick strides and turn toward the beach.

"She walks a lot," explained Quil. "Cries a lot, walks a lot. Flinches a lot. Doesn't say much."

"She seems mostly okay."

"She's a mess. She needs Emb. But she talked a lot to _you._ " He elbowed her in the ribs. "You're the life of the party."

"Search party."

They returned to the woods and headed toward Leah's house on another trail that would hopefully keep them out of Charlie's view. She hoped he wasn't over there visiting Harry. The trail ended in a sloped field behind the last houses on a block near the marina, and as they left the shelter of the trees, it started to rain hard. Their hair was plastered to their heads in seconds. Quil raised a fist and shook it at the sky, cursing the weather in slow motion like a hero in a bad action movie.

"Nooooo...!" said Bella, mimicking him, pretending to fall in slow motion. But then she fell for real, sliding on her rear and muddying her pants and hands.

Laughing, Quil pretended to be tripped by her, also in slow motion, but then he, too, fell for real and landed half on top of her, one hand pressing her shoulder into the mud and sliding her before him as he fell completely prone. Her shoulder wore a deep groove in the ground as she traveled—"Geez! How tall are you?" "Six, two?"—as she traveled six feet and two inches through the mud and slick weeds. "Thanks a lot."

He rolled onto his back and shook his fist at the sky again as Bella stood up, shaking water from her hands, to assess the damage. Hands: muddy. Hair: muddy. Pants: muddy. Red wool coat: muddy. Green flannel, hanging loose and unbuttoned, and the white T-shirt she wore beneath the coat: also muddy, since she hadn't buttoned the coat, and completely soaked through. She could see the outline of her bra and even her belly button where the shirt clung to her. There was mud seeping beneath the waistband of her jeans. Quil was rolling in slow motion, still laughing, still yelling at the clouds. He pretended to roll down the slope into her ankles, yelling, "Looook... Ooouuuuttt...!" and Bella cursed her own clumsiness because even in slow motion, he was impossible for her to avoid. She tripped again and landed once more on her hands, sliding within moments onto her belly and losing one shoe. Quil picked it up and shook it at the sky. Bella used a few words she had learned from Leah, making him laugh harder, so she wiped her hands clean on his coat.

Quil grabbed her wrists and flipped her onto her back. He knelt over her and shook his wet curls in her face.

"God dammit, Quil!"

"Aw, yeah!" he said, letting her up. "You look like _Girls Gone Wild._ The mud wrestling one. You should totally take off your coat."

"No."

Rain poured down on them as they trudged across the field. Quil was still laughing when they reached the Clearwaters' backyard. It was fenced. Bella crouched behind a rhododendron bush while Quil hopped the fence and checked for Charlie's car. When he gave her the all clear, she struggled over the fence as well, landing hard on one knee—more mud—and they approached the back door. Mrs. Clearwater would not let them in, so Leah and Seth came to laugh at them through the sliding glass door.

" _Girls Gone Wild,_ right?" Quil said to Seth.

"Take off your coat, Bella."

Leah smacked him.

* * *

A short time later, Bella and Leah were walking down the river road past the United States Coast Guard Station. It was an odd presence on the south bank of the Quillayute River, where two of the world's most modern ships lay at the ready, while at the other side of the village, Sam had helped restore an ancient-model, ocean-going cedar canoe. As they walked, gravel crunched beneath the girls' shoes.

"I'm scared," said Leah.

They were on their way to Sam's house.

Rain continued to fall. After Seth and Leah were done cracking up, Quil went home and Leah offered Bella some dry clothes and a real raincoat. Sue had allowed her to stand on a towel just inside the door, but no matter how many times Leah shooed Seth away, Bella couldn't be sure he wasn't still peeking around a corner, so she only allowed herself to change her coat. Now it lay in a plastic trash bag that slapped heavily against her legs as she walked. Eventually she lifted it higher and tossed it over her shoulder. The girls traded clues as they walked.

First, said Bella, there was Harry's refusal to tell Charlie about what was happening in La Push. She didn't say that it seemed related to vampires, of course, but she did tell Leah that it seemed related to the murders in the national park. Leah said that her father had been having occasional chest pain for the past couple months. Something was profoundly stressing him out, but he wouldn't talk to anyone in their family about it. He would only talk to Billy and Old Quil, who, incidentally, happened to be the only three members of the tribal counsel.

"Do you think he knows who the murderer is?" said Leah.

"No."

Then what, she wondered, could the three of them be hiding? Something illegal? "Maybe they're embezzling tribal funds." She frowned at the wet road. "It's something awful, that's all I can tell."

Next, said Bella, reciting another clue, Sam and Paul had made Embry take Jacob into the woods around midnight, almost two weeks ago, after she and Jacob had shared their first kiss.

"He kissed you?!" said Leah. Her whole face lit up with a huge smile. "No! He did? Oh, Bella—"

"Actually," said Bella, feeling a bit smug, "I kissed him."

Leah skipped and laughed out loud. Her voice was strong and bright in the misty air. "I'm so happy for you! Oh, my God, this is perfect. He's gotta be so thrilled, so— Oh, I'm happy for him, too! How many times has he called you since then? Like, a million?"

No, said Bella, that was exactly the problem. Not only had she not _seen_ him since that night, she hadn't even spoken to him on the phone. "Their phone is unplugged. I stopped there first. Their phone's unplugged; their house is a mess; no one's picking up the mail or taking out the trash." Tears returned to her eyes. "His bedroom looks looted; it just looks _wrong_. Something bad has happened." She tried to take deep breaths to quell her tears as Leah put her hands in her pockets, studying the road. Very bad, she agreed. Nothing would keep him from her. Nothing.

Sam probably knew what happened to Jacob. Sam probably caused it, said Bella. He was at the center of this, right next to Billy. But Sam wasn't going to invite them to his house for tea and spill his guts. They were going to have to find the next best thing. The only person to whom he _might_ spill his guts.

"I haven't seen her in six months," said Leah quietly.

"Maybe she won't be there."

"She never goes anywhere else."

Sam's house was way back in the woods. The road along the riverbank went inland, eastward, past a few dirt driveways with battered steel mailboxes leaning on their posts, and then it continued for a long distance past no driveways, no intersections, just deeper into the green wood until it seemed they were walking through a tunnel. The branches overhead were so thickly interlaced that the trees sheltered them from most of the rain.

Bella's wet shoes audibly squelched as they walked. She was beginning worry about how to prevent Charlie's noticing, at dinner time, that she had done anything other than stay put and do her homework. And she wasn't sure what time it was, either. Neither she nor Leah had a watch or a cell phone to check. Also, she worried about her appearance. What a way to make a first impression. She imagined the introduction at the end of the road: _Hi there. You don't know me, but I'm the one who smashed your boyfriend's truck, and I suspect he's done something bad to my boyfriend, and I want you to tell me your innermost secrets. Oh, and please don't mind my clothes or shoes or hair or hands or face. It was an accident. I hope you don't have a white sofa. Can I come in?_

Yeah, right. She tried to wipe some mud out of her hair.

She also worried about what she would do if this turned out to be another dead end. What then? Sneak out at night? Spy on Billy and Old Quil through the trees like Quil? What were they doing with her stuff? What was this seventy-year old allegiance or oath Harry had accidentally mentioned? Whom was he protecting by his silence? Why would Billy unplug his phone? And where was Jacob if he wasn't at home, or Quil's house, or Embry's house, or at school? Her panicky feeling returned, and she tried to stuff it down with angry determination.

The gravel road petered out, changing to a dirt track, and still they walked on. Bella kept to the rise of moss and grass in between the wheel ruts. Putting her hands in the jacket pockets, she discovered an old package of sunflower seeds. Leah said she could have some, and she was hungry so she ate a few handfuls. When they came to the end of the road, Leah paused near Sam's mailbox. It was made of plastic and shaped like a largemouth bass. Bella almost laughed at it, but Leah was leaning against a pine tree, raindrops falling from its needles like stars. She had her eyes closed.

Bella stood with her in respectful silence. After a moment, she said, "What should I do?"

Leah looked at her.

"I mean, what should I smash for you? I think I see the truck up there." She was encouraged to see Leah smile a little, so she opened the mailbox. "How about we fill this with rocks?"

Leah said some mushy things about friendship, squared her shoulders, declared she had never said any such mushy things about friendship as Bella may have thought she'd heard, and started up the driveway.

The Uley house looked like a log cabin. Sam lived there with his relatives. He had been working construction in the summers since he was fifteen, and two years ago some rich guy from Seattle had ordered a log home kit to be delivered to Port Angeles, intending to build a vacation house just west of the city in a new development on a bluff above the water. Leah had been there once. The bare naked lots alone cost about five times her family's yearly income. In summer, from that bluff, the Strait of Juan de Fuca looked turquoise blue, and on a clear day you could see to Canada. The Seattle guy's long home kit arrived from the mill on six flat bed trucks. Sam's boss won the contract to build it. It was maybe twenty-five percent assembled when they discovered that the mill had made a horrible mistake: parts of two kits jumbled together. They wouldn't take it back or provide a new one. The Seattle guy spent his vacation time with a lawsuit. Sam asked—passionately but humbly—to buy the materials. Leah said he would beg for his mother, of course he would, and he wasn't a bit ashamed. But the contractor, whom Sam had come to regard as a fatherly figure, just gave them to him. What a boon! Sam's whole family was deeply moved. "There's some people in the world who are not assholes," said Leah. "It's true." His mother took out a loan to arrange for a trucking company to deliver everything, and Sam and his friends from his crew and the tribe worked three months to put up the house, with some inventive fixes, before the rainy season.

"It was like a huge party," said Leah. She had been sixteen at the time; Sam, nineteen. "I hammered in that porch railing. I varnished most of the floors." It was a small house, intended, of course, for a vacation cabin, but it had three bedrooms and a fireplace and a nice kitchen. Now it was, without a doubt, one of the most beautiful houses in La Push. "Those shingles are cedar. I helped with that, too."

Bella knew that Leah had once imagined that this would become her home. "You should take the shingles back," she whispered.

Leah smirked, eyeing the roofline. Her bravado left her at the door, however. She couldn't knock.

 _Think, Bella, think!_

She was _not_ just going to turned around and slink away from their last hope for clues. A month ago, hanging out in the garage with Jacob, she'd stared at him while he curled over his knees on the floor, freaked out that his dad might be ill or even dying. She had felt numb and a little confused. A little scared. But she had fought through the fog and put a hand on his shoulder. _Um..._ she could remember herself saying, _He's okay. Probably._ How hard that had been! But now— Hmm...

"Baaaawk. Baaawk, baaawk, baaaaaawk," she croaked, almost in a whisper. She had never heard an actual chicken, but she was pretty sure this strategy would work on Leah.

"Baaaawk. Bukka, bukka, bukka!"

"Shh!"

"Bukka bukka bukka!"

Leah shoved her shoulder, making Bella stumble, but she also rapped her knuckles on the door.

Then they waited.

After a few moments, the door cracked open a couple inches, and a young woman peered out, half of her face hidden, the other half pale as a sand-washed shell. Her delicately arched eyebrow looked just like Leah's, and her lips were a rosy blush color, small and well-defined. Her deep, black eye, the only one she showed around the edge of the door, immediately trembled with a tear; it spilled down her cheek as Leah gently pushed open the door.

* * *

Ten minutes later, five women and one little girl sat at Sam's kitchen table: Mrs. Clara Uley, Sam's grandmother; Mrs. Allison Uley, Sam's mother; Leah Clearwater; Bella Swan; Emily Young; and a little girl called Claire. Emily said she was her niece. Claire was three. She sat on Emily's lap holding a soft toy zebra, about six inches high, and a plastic spatula with which she said she was styling the zebra's hair.

There was a sixth woman in a chair by the fireplace: Sam's great-grandmother, Ellen Uley, a tiny, nut-brown woman with long white hair, wound in a knot at the nape of her neck, and a wealth of wrinkles crossing her face. She had to be at least ninety years old. Clara, Allison, and Ellen were all bound by surname, but not by blood. Each had married that name but lost the man: Ellen and Clara to death, and Allison to irresponsibility, infidelity, and wanderlust, as far as Bella could tell. The thing they all had in common was Sam. And Leah. And Emily. Bella silently helped herself to a dishtowel sitting on the kitchen counter, spread it on a chair, and sat beside Leah, trying to be unobtrusive. The three older women looked between Emily and Leah, and no one seemed to know what to say. Emily and Leah clutched each other's hands under the table.

When they had first arrived, Bella had hardly been able to look at Leah and Emily's reunion. There had been a lot of tears. Leah had so many questions, mostly agonized _why's?_ Emily couldn't stop apologizing. "I said, 'No,'" she sobbed. "Then this happened. I didn't know what to do." She cried so hard that Leah looked frightened, and she just hugged her cousin and rocked back and forth while staring at Bella over her shoulder, staring as if to say, _Now what?_ but Bella had no idea. Bella was glad Emily was weeping with her eyes lowered, because it allowed her to take in her face with one long, searching stare.

It was horrible.

Four red, puckered, parallel lines ran from her right temple to her left shoulder, and probably, Bella suspected, down her left arm. The lines were deeply grooved, and the innermost one marred the outer corners of her right eye and her mouth, making them larger, redder, and turned down. When she opened her mouth, Bella could see that the gash went deeper through her lip and cheek. Her right cheekbone seemed very close to the surface of her skin, or maybe her skin was simply lying closer to the bone with little flesh underneath. _How had she not bled out?_ wondered Bella, aghast at the path of the bear's claws, tearing down her neck and across one, if not both, jugular vein. Her left collarbone had clearly been broken; it had healed but appeared sunken into her chest. On her left hand, the first joint of her smallest finger was gone, nail and all.

Now everyone but Ellen sat at the dining table. The room was wide and open, with the living room, dining room, and kitchen flowing together, which enhanced the feeling of being in a log cabin. The floor, walls, and vaulted ceiling were varnished, golden pine. A stone fireplace sat in the center of the wall between the living and dining areas. Its chimney was made of round granite beach stones in many colors: bluish gray, sandy brown, charcoal gray, speckled white, and black. A few stones were a beautiful pale green.

Sam's mother offered them a glass of water or a cup of coffee, but she and Leah declined. They all sat at the table. Bella began to think that they'd never have a chance to ask their questions, much less get some answers, because Sam's family smothered conversation by their mere presence. Allison hugged Leah and said how much she missed her, and Leah said she missed her, too. Then they seemed to realize how this must sound to Emily, whose eyes had filled with tears again, and who was looking out the window, and they stopped talking. Emily hugged Claire and put her face in Claire's hair, and Claire patted Emily's face with her spatula. Emily didn't ask her to stop.

"Hi," said Bella, after an uncomfortable pause.

Ellen, Clara, Allison, and Emily blinked at her.

"Um, thanks for letting me visit." No one said anything else, so she added, "This is a nice house."

"Leah varnished the floors," said Allison.

"And she installed the porch railing," added Clara.

"Shingles," said Ellen. Her voice was scratchy. She began to cough, a rough, hollow hacking, as she held a tissue over her mouth. "Emphysema. I got that, too."

"I did the shingles," said Leah.

"And I have a rash," said Ellen.

"Shingles," explained Clara. "There's two kinds!"

Ellen laughed at the joke and coughed more.

"This is Bella," said Leah. "My friend."

Bella gave a little wave to everyone.

"Bella Swan?" said Emily, and when she nodded Emily said, "Oh."

Ellen looked at Bella with the kind of direct stare only an extremely old person can get away with. "You are a very stupid girl."

"Momma!" said Clara.

Allison had a similar exclamation.

Bella flushed and looked at the table.

"Zhhhooo...," said Claire, running the spatula over her toy. "I blow dryin' my zeeba's hair."

Softly, from a shelf near the fireplace, a clock chimed. It was a quarter after five o'clock. Bella's eyes shot to the clock and then to Leah, who knew that Bella had to get home by six.

"How have you been?" said Leah. "All of you?"

"Fine, fine," said Clara and Allison. "Still working at the bank," said Allison. "Evergreen State Savings, in Forks."

"That's my bank," said Bella. "Is it nice to work there?"

"No."

"Oh."

"Pays the bills."

"Emily's going to help me sell my baskets," said Clara. She had a sun-worn face and short, iron gray hair that was curled and brushed back from her forehead, and she wore burgundy slacks with a permanent crease and a sweatshirt with flowers on it. Bella noticed a bundle of cedar bark, cut in narrow strips, beside the fireplace. "Emily's going to get me in touch with the people at the Makah welcome center in Port Angeles. Before April. For the tourists."

"Oh," said Bella again.

"I _think_ I can," said Emily.

"And she's learning to weave," said Clara. "Show her."

Obediently, Emily set Claire on her feet, reached behind the bark bundle, and lifted a square of her work. The loose ends swayed and flopped as she set it on the table. It looked, Bella thought, like a placemat with an extremely long, raggedy fringe. "It's not done yet," said Emily.

"Clara is teaching her," said Allison.

"It's very bad," said Ellen.

"Momma!" said Clara.

"Shingles!" said Ellen. There was a glass jar of pale greenish goo on the hearth; she smeared some of this over her arms, and Bella caught the scents of lavender and rosemary. Maybe salt. Maybe olive oil. Then she picked up a piece of wood from the pile near the fire, a piece about as long as Bella's arm that was basically a large stick, and set it across her lap.

"It's very bad," agreed Emily.

Bella looked at the irregular weave. "I can't throw or catch a ball," she offered. "Or hit anything with a racquet or bat."

Emily made a quick, watery smile with one half of her face.

"Or walk without falling sometimes." She waved a hand up and down her body to explain her appearance.

"She was walking with Quil," said Leah, and every other person, except Claire, said "Ohhhh..."

"We were wondering," said Bella, glancing again at the clock, "if you've seen Jacob."

"Jacob Black?" said Ellen sharply. "Who is he to you?"

"My, uh, boyfriend?"

"Oh, he _is?_ " said Emily. "That's ni—

"Ha!" said Ellen. "Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha!" She looked at the ceiling and said, "You can call me home, Lord, because now I've really seen everything." Then she pulled a Bowie knife out of the pocket of her long, heavy, denim skirt and began to whittle fat chips of wood from her stick while staring at Bella.

Leah tried to get the conversation back on track, but a movement at the window caught her eye. Bella followed her glance and saw a black and white car pulling into the driveway. Two men got out. Sam. And her father.

"Shit!" she said. Emily put her hands over Claire's ears. "Sorry. I just—"

"We have to hide," said Leah.

"Is that your daddy?" said Ellen. She got up and wobbled to the window, where she lifted the glass and hollered, "You have no business here! We ain't done anything wrong!"

"Put down the knife, Grammy," said Sam.

Emily stood up and motioned for Leah and Bella to go out the back door. "What's wrong?" she hissed as they hurried out. "Later," whispered Leah, and she and Bella hopped down from the back porch just as they heard the front door opening. Emily closed the back door quickly.

Sam's back porch sat about three feet above the backyard, a nice grassy clearing with a small flower garden and what looked like a corn patch off to one side. Mostly it was a wide open plain, the kind of space where someone looking out the dining room window—oh, let's say, someone's father, perhaps—could easily spot a teenager fleeing. Bella and Leah crouched below the dining room window in the damp grass, their backs against the house. At least the rain had let up. Beneath the porch, a pair of chipmunks tousled in the dirt.

"Oh, no," whispered Leah. "The chipmunks are back."

"So?"

"Last year they made a nest under the house. Had little babies. Loud, squeaky babies. Sam's mom told him to put some netting around the bottom of the porch, but I guess he forgot."

Bella took another look under the porch. Though dark and full of spiderwebs, it looked fairly dry. She supposed if she were a chipmunk, that would be a good place for a nest. In fact, if Charlie came outside, it might be a good place to hide. She tried to weigh the amount of trouble she'd be in if she were caught here against the creepy shivers that ran down her spine at the thought of all those spiders.

Above their heads, the window opened about an inch. "I feel too warm," they heard Emily say. Bella looked at Leah, who winked. Her eyes were sparkling. _I love her!_ she mouthed. It occurred to Bella that she had only known Leah for a month, and in that time they had destroyed a truck, snuck out of school, tickled Quil senseless, made a nearly-toxic leftover soup, sobbed their guts out over their ex-boyfriends, and made a pact to watch out for each other's hearts. And if all that had happened in a month, what bonds must Leah and Emily have formed through all their lives!

"Thanks," Leah whispered. "For making me come here."

Bella smiled.

From inside the house, they heard Charlie thanking Sam's mother for a glass of water. There was some warm, friendly small talk—Charlie had known her husband, Bella remembered—and then chairs scraped over the floor, and she knew everyone had settled around the table.

"I'd just like to ask you a few questions," said Charlie.

"Okay," said Emily in a small voice.

A tiny, fuzzy chipmunk tottered out from under the porch. _A baby!_ mouthed Leah. _So cute!_ Sniffing the air, its tiny nose twitching, it wandered nearer and sat down close to their feet, chewing on a blade of grass.

"I understand you were injured by an animal," said Charlie.

"Yes," said Emily.

"When did this occur?"

"August," she said quietly. "August fifteenth."

A second baby chipmunk tottered out to join the first. Bella reached into Leah's jacket pocket and took out the sunflower seeds. Leah had to stifle a giggle. The girls each held out a seed pinched between their thumbs and index fingers, and after a minute or two, one of the chipmunks approached.

 _No fear,_ mouthed Leah. _Isn't it amazing?_

 _Too young to fear people?_

 _Ellen probably feeds them._

Maybe that was it, conceded Bella. A third, then a fourth baby chipmunk emerged from under the porch, and pretty soon they were all nibbling seeds from their hands. Bella had never been this close to wildlife before—if chipmunks could be considered wildlife. It was thrilling. They were adorable! She loved their black, shiny eyes and striped tails. They held the seeds in their tiny pink fingers, sitting up tall.

 _This is awesome,_ Bella mouthed. _You look like Snow White._

 _You can be Dumpy the dwarf._

 _There's no Dumpy the dwarf._

 _There is now._ Leah shoved her. She fell on her elbow and the chipmunks skittered away.

This should not have been funny. She should have been freaking out, wondering how she was going to get home on time and get a shower. But she couldn't help it. She had to bite her tongue to keep from laughing. She couldn't remember the last time she had laughed, and it was all she could do to hold it in.

 _He's gonna kill me,_ she mouthed. _I am so screwed._

 _Here comes another one._

Leah placed a trail of seeds in the grass, and soon the little babies were eating out of their hands again, along with a fifth one that had wandered out.

"What kind of animal injured you?" asked Charlie.

"A bear," said Emily. Her voice had risen slightly in pitch. "A bear."

"Describe the bear."

"I don't know. It looked like a bear."

There was a pause.

"You know, a regular bear. Brown. Furry. It had large claws, as you can see."

A baby squirrel and its parents scampered out from under the deck to feast on the sunflower seeds. The contrast between what was going on inside and outside the house was enough to make her giddy with conflicting emotions. _I can't find Jacob. What if Sam finds_ me _out here? How am I going to get home?_ Also, _I never got so close to a chipmunk before! Look at its tiny white teeth! Its little paws!_ And then again, _Get a hold of yourself, Bella. Focus. Find a way out of this!_

She flopped her head back against the house. It made a soft thump. She looked at the clouds and bit her lip, not sure whether to laugh or cry. One of the squirrels scratched at her shoe. It tickled.

Suddenly the back door opened and Sam stuck his head out. His nostrils flared when he saw them. Bella made an agonized plea for silence, holding a finger to her lips. Leah held a different finger high in the air, the back or her hand toward him, and spat in the grass.

"Everything okay out there, Sam?" said Charlie.

"Uh, yes." He frowned at them. "I just heard a squirrel. We got a squirrel problem under the porch. Chipmunks. All kinds of trouble out there."

"I told you to put up some netting," said Allison.

"No," said Ellen. "They're my babies."

"They're rodents," said Clara. "They carry diseases."

"They love me."

"Stripey ones," said Claire. "I love the big stripey ones. I give them toast."

While his relatives argued about the squirrels, Sam closed the door very slowly, glaring at them.

Charlie had more questions for Emily about the location of the incident, the size of the bear compared to other bears, whether the bear had a long tail, and why she thought the bear may have reacted aggressively. As Emily answered each question, she sounded flustered.

 _She is flunking this interview,_ thought Bella. _Why?_

"It was at Neah Bay," she was saying. "At a park."

"Which park?"

"Cape Flattery."

"Lots of tourists there. Especially in August. Did anyone else see this bear?"

"No."

"No reports of other bear encounters there? Sam, could you look into this for me? Tomorrow at the station?"

"Uh, sure."

Leah sprinkled a few more sunflower seeds on the grass. She even put a few on Bella's shoe, and Bella was delighted, moments later, when a chipmunk hopped near her shoe and took one of the seeds. Excited, she held very still.

Emily continued awkwardly. "It had a regular-sized bear tail. I didn't really look at it. I guess it was regular bear-sized. Overall, I guess its whole body was regular bear-sized."

"Have you seen other bears?"

"No. Well, once. At a campground. I was ten, maybe. Maybe twelve."

"Is that the only other time you saw a bear?"

"Yes."

"So how can you be sure the bear that attacked you was 'regular bear-sized'? Maybe you don't have a good point of comparison."

Leah scattered more seeds, placing more on their shoes, but she was looking at the grass soberly. She, too, had yet to hear the story of how the bear attacked Emily.

"I don't know why the bear did it," Emily continued. "I think it was upset."

"Upset?"

"It was— It happened suddenly." Her voice became strained.

"She doesn't like to talk about it," said Sam. "It's okay, babe, you don't have to talk about it."

"I'm sorry to cause you distress." Charlie was using his "reassure-the-victim" voice; Bella had heard him coach his deputies on how to do this. Lower the volume. Soft eye contact. Stuff like that. "But it's very important to talk about it, if you can. Other lives may depend on it."

"Well, I— I don't think it will happen again."

"Why not?" said Charlie

But Emily wouldn't say anything else. It was clear that she was anxious, and Charlie didn't press her further. He merely thanked her and gave her his card with the station's number on it. Then Allison came to the table and they began to talk about old times, sharing stories of Sam as a kid. Clara said she always thought Sam would do some kind of public service work when he grew up. She talked about what a great opportunity it was for him to work with Charlie, and Charlie said some stuff about how much aptitude Sam had for the job, and Sam himself made some "Aw, shucks, Grandma" remarks and tried to steer the conversation toward any other topic: Fishing. The weather. The Huskies. Even basket weaving. Nothing caught on.

 _Sam, Sam, Sam,_ mouthed Leah sourly. _Sam's so great. Sam's so smart._

"Can I have toast for the big stripeys?" said Claire.

"Ellen, do not give that child any more toast," said Allison.

It was at this moment that another baby animal waddled out from under the porch. It was about the size of a kitten, black furred, with two white stripes running from its small, pointed head to the tip of its long, fluffy tail. The pads of its hands and toes were black. Even its nose was black. Its little round ears flicked this way and that. Leah's eyes widened as it came closer, and she held absolutely still.

"Oh, God," whispered Bella. "Is that—"

"Yes."

It approached Bella, sniffed her shoe, and climbed onto it to eat the seeds. Then, to her horror, two of its litter mates scampered through the grass and gathered on and around their feet, eating the seeds. _Please, please, please..._ mouthed Leah, looking heavenward. It didn't seem to help. A fourth, fifth, sixth, and seventh little stripey emerged from under the porch. They were bolder than the chipmunks, circling the girls' feet and even slipping beneath their knees as they sat on their bottoms with their legs bent, their feet in front of them. One hopped onto Bella's lap and looked at her pointedly.

 _Toast?_ it was probably thinking.

Inside, they heard chairs moved back from the table as Charlie said goodbye. Someone walked him to the front door. They heard the sound of his cruiser starting up and driving away.

"I gotta get home," Bella whispered.

"Don't you fucking move," whispered Leah.

 _Cursed little stripeys!_

Leah motioned with her eyes to the far corner of Sam's backyard. "There's a trail there. Goes to Old Quil's garden. Is that where you left your truck?"

She almost nodded, but instead just blinked. Leah took that as once for yes, two for no.

"You can run up the hill. Short trail."

"Okay. When?"

"Well, not _now._ We need a diversion." With the smallest flick of her finger, Leah tipped over the package of sunflower seeds. They spilled into a golden pile in the grass, and all the little animals scurried to it, except for the one on Bella's lap.

"Shoo," she whispered.

Just then the _big_ stripeys appeared, waddling from beneath the porch with their black and white tails curled curiously. They acted like they owned the place. The girls froze as they joined their offspring at the pile of seeds. As they ate, they made chirping and clicking noises that would have been cute if they weren't the fattest, happiest, most enormous skunks Bella had ever even imagined. _Holy Mary, Mother of Pearl! How much toast is that girl feeding them?_ She noticed a couple of carrots and a well-gnawed apple core at the bottom of the steps.

"I gotta get out of here!" she hissed.

"Do _not_ move!"

The backdoor flew open and Sam stuck his head out. He didn't say anything, but the sudden movement spooked the skunks. "No, no, no, no, no...!" said Leah as the animals spun and raised their tails. She tucked herself into a ball and rolled under the porch as Bella stood up and pressed her back against the house, petrified. The skunks soaked her from the waist down in a liquid so foul it made her gasp and choke.

"Aaahhhrrgggg!" said Bella. She raised the back of her right hand to her nose as if to protect herself from the scent, but her hand had been sprayed along with her pants, and she got the smell on her nose. Tears came to her eyes and she kicked at the skunks. She actually connected with one of the babies, lifting it on her toe and launching it into the flower garden.

At the window, Claire screamed. Leah was screaming, too, having crawled out from under the porch: "These are not pets! Not pets!"

"There are spiders on you!" said Sam, and Leah screamed back, "Don't touch me!"

"But they're really big! On your hair!"

More screaming. Leah batted her hair and threatened to claw his eyes out if he touched her, so he grabbed a broom that stood against the wall and leaned over the railing with it, reaching for her. Emily came out onto the porch and told Sam to leave Leah alone, and Claire followed, clinging to her legs and shrieking, "Spiders! Spiders!" over and over.

Allison came out with a freshly opened can of tomato juice, coughing, saying to Leah, "Wash with this right away," but Leah said that she hadn't been skunked; it was Bella; and Allison staggered to the porch railing, one hand over her mouth and nose. Bella thought she was aiming to toss the tomato juice all over her, so she turned and ran.

The trail through the Uleys' woods was narrow, slick, and uphill. Twice she fell on her knee as she raced through wet branches that hung over the trail, slapping her. Would this make her clean? Could anything make her clean? She wished she could outrun the sharp, sour scent of herself. Her legs burned as she struggled uphill, her heart pounding, and then she stopped short in the middle of the trail and gasped.

In the mud in front of her was an enormous paw print. Just like the ones in Charlie's photos.

She knelt and touched it. It seemed like a mirage, or a bubble that would vanish when her finger prodded it, but it was very, very real. Very large. Larger than the spread of all her fingers. She could see clearly the mark of a central pad, four toe pads, and the deep impressions of claws. As she stared, it slowly began to fill with water.

It wasn't raining anymore.

The sodden earth was allowing water to seep into the impression from the bottom.

Her heart pounded harder as she recognized the significance. This print was _fresh._ Maybe only a few minutes old. Lifting her eyes, she saw that the trail was littered with them. More than one was slowly filling with water.

Sound vanished from her mind as she sprinted forward, her lungs aching, blood pounding in her ears, tears streaming from her eyes with the wind. She prayed for a break in the trees ahead, a sign that she was getting closer to the garden, but all she saw was green, green, green, only ferns and mosses and pines. Her hair streamed behind her; the cold air burned her cheeks. At last she sighted sky ahead between the branches. She almost choked with relief. Then a root sent her sprawling. She slid downhill several feet, twisting on the slippery ground, becoming disoriented. Scrambling to her feet, she glanced frantically in all directions. Where was the garden? Where was the trail?

Movement caught her eye, not thirty feet away. Something moved in the branches; she saw flashes of reddish brown fur between the leaves. It moved with slow, sinuous power, nose to the ground, heavy paws making no sound on the moss. When it stepped from the green shadows, she had to will herself not to faint.

From its black snout to its black-tipped ears; from its moon-white canines to its curved, lethal claws; from its broad, ruffed chest to its red, lashing tail, every inch of this animal said, _Predator._ Said, _I am Death._ Its cold black eyes were ancient wells into which centuries could vanish. But they revealed something greater than instinct: Something intelligent. Something that, for a moment, looked vulnerable.

Its massive head lowered, scapulae rising in their red cloak as it hunched nearer. It fixed its eyes on her, and she felt almost immobilized by the intensity of its stare. Almost. She drew in a breath to scream, but a large, firm hand clamped over her mouth. Sam pulled her against his chest.

"I told you not to do this," he growled.

She pushed at his arms, but he held tight. The animal's black eyes seemed to tremble; she was filled with a desire to weep for this thing and the ache she saw in its eyes; and the inexplicable emotion pushed her over the edge into plain, flat-out panic. Sam's hand muffled her screams.

"Listen to me," he snarled. "You are going to leave here. Leave now."

She realized he was talking to the animal. It stood higher on its toes, muscles quivering with readiness. Sam spoke to it threateningly, but it kept its eyes on Bella, straining against—or toward—some urge or emotion. After another moment, the fight went out of it. The fur on its brow quirked, just like a dog's.

"I'm sorry," Sam said quietly.

The thing vanished into the trees, Sam took his hand off Bella's face, and she slid to her knees.

"What was—"

"Get home. Don't come here again. Don't talk about this. You didn't see anything." He yanked her to her feet and forced her along the trail. Moments later, she was staggering into the clear air of the garden. Sam held open the door of her truck.

"Wait," she puffed. She could hardly stand for all her trembling, but the adrenaline of her fear was already morphing into anger. "You can't— What was that?"

"You can't come here anymore. This never happened."

"The hell it didn't!"

"I'm going to walk into work tomorrow with your father and everything's going to be normal. You're not going to talk about this. He's not going to find out anything else about bears—"

"Is that the bear?"

"—and nobody else is going to get hurt. The Park will be safe again. Forks will be safe."

"From _that?!_ " she screeched.

"Please." Sam crossed his arms and looked away, into the mist. It seemed that was a hard word for him to say.

"No! I need to find Jacob. _You_ sent him into the woods. _That_ lives in the woods. Where is he?"

"Safe."

"Where?" The word _please_ welled up in her own heart, but she wasn't going to give him the satisfaction of hearing it. "You tell me where he is." Sam made no reply. "I'm not just going to go away. I'm going to find him and save him."

"If you want to save him, then shut up. If you care, then you will tell _no one_ about this. Especially not Charlie Swan. If you break this secret, _that_ will hurt him." He grabbed her shoulders. "This is very, very important. Tell no one. Promise."

"No! I—"

"There are worse things than vampires in the world. So shut up. Or you'll be opening a door to death for more than one person."

She didn't understand, but his words frightened her.

"Damn him!" said Sam. He pounded a fist on her hood, and it made a dent. Then, as the two of them stared at it, a tiny portion of the metal crumbled away, revealing a serious, serious rust problem.

"You dented my truck!" she yelled.

Sam threw back his head and laughed long and loud. He pushed her into the cab and slammed the door. Rolling down her window, she started the engine and growled, "I'll be back."

Sam sniffed his shirt where he'd held her against his chest. "You stink, Bella."

She backed up, switched to first gear, and turned her wheels toward the road. When she hit the gas, mud sprayed over the lettuce bed. "I'm coming back!" she yelled out the window, and he hollered, furiously, "You keep your mouth shut!" And then, in the rearview mirror, she saw Sam slump against a tree trunk, putting his hands over his face.

* * *

When she got home, the sky was deepening to purple and the streetlights were on. A chilly wind blew up the street. She parked in the driveway and sat still, gripping the steering wheel, her arms shaking.

What was that _thing_ in the woods? Could it have killed her? Had it hurt Jacob? Was it Sam's monster? Was it— Oh, God, had it murdered those hikers? _Think, Bella, think!_

Charlie had said the bodies were surrounded by paw prints, but no animals had gnawed on the corpse. No lacerations in the flesh. No scoring of the bones. Sam and Paul kept messing up the paw prints Charlie wanted to investigate, stepping on them, brushing leaves over them. _Number One Paw Print Fucker-Upper_ he had called Sam. So Sam wanted to hide this thing. And Paul knew about it, too.

Was this the "bear" that had clawed Emily? Why hadn't she been able to describe a bear to Charlie without using vague, non-specific language? _A regular, bear-sized bear,_ she had said. Ha! Its sheer size made it unrecognizable, but it was _definitely not_ a bear. That thing was a bigger than any tiger or lion she had seen at a zoo. Bigger than a mule. Maybe as big as a bison. It seemed likely that Emily knew about Sam's monster.

She tried to calm herself as the truck's engine cooled, clicking and pinging. Now she had two mysteries on her hands: Jacob's disappearance and whatever-the-fuck that _thing_ was. Could they be connected? Had it hurt him? Had he discovered it and been forced to go away by Sam? And should she tell Charlie? Sam said telling someone would harm Jacob. Was that true or was that blackmail? She could maybe keep her mouth shut for twenty-four hours. Then she was going to need some answers.

The kitchen light flicked on and a rectangular patch of light appeared on the driveway. She saw Charlie at the window, glaring at her. Holy shit, she was in trouble.

Sliding from the cab was easier than usual, thanks to the smears of mud all over her body. She shut the door and squelched through the grass to the backdoor so she could strip in the laundry room and get all her stuff in the washing machine. She wondered if Charlie had any tomato juice. She climbed the steps and entered the house without touching anything but the doorknob.

"God dammit, Bella—" began Charlie, but then he coughed and said, "Skunk? Were you actually sprayed by a skunk?"

"Nine skunks," she admitted.

"Jesus, why? Why did you send me this child?" He turned and headed up the stairs for a towel. She heard doors slamming. She closed the door to the kitchen, put Leah's coat and all her clothes into the washer, including her shoes, and huddled naked against the wall beside the door until Charlie came back and opened the door a crack, passing her the towel. After she wrapped it around herself, she scurried to the bathroom.

No, said Charlie, he didn't have any tomato juice. She'd have to make do with ketchup. She got in the shower and cried as she squeezed cold ketchup all over herself. After a few minutes, Charlie came back with baking soda, dish soap, and hydrogen peroxide, a remedy he'd looked up on the internet, and set them on the lip of the bathtub. Then he returned to the hall so she could reach past the green curtain and preserve her modesty, if not her dignity, when picking them up.

"If I had a dungeon, you'd be in it," he said. He sounded utterly disgusted with her. That was all he said.

She washed all the mud away but couldn't get the skunk smell completely off. Quil's Twinkies, Tiffany's brownie, and a couple handfuls of sunflower seeds would have to suffice for dinner because she was _not_ going downstairs to face Charlie. She changed the sheets on her bed to a set she didn't care about, put on pajamas that were old and expendable, and curled up on her side, staring out the window at the black forest.

It was eight o'clock. She didn't feel sleepy. She turned the events of the day over and over like stones. Her photos in a cooler in a shed. Quil's emotional swings. Tiffany Call's questions. Emily's scars. Sam's fury. And that terrifying animal. That monster.

It was magic. That was the only explanation. If vampires were real, then so must be all kinds of other things. She had touched that paw print with her own finger, and it was real.

Eventually, in spite of herself, she fell asleep. It was past midnight when she awoke from a dream of running through the forest after Edward, shivering on the ground all night, and being approached by a warm giant, its nose chuffing, its breath flowing over her. Then Sam. Images rushed together: the paintings on the wall of the Quileute Community Center, traditional drawings in thick and thin black lines, animals within other animals' bodies, lives within a life, the animals' heads thrown back, canines and large eyes angled at the sky. The proud tails. The powerful claws. Images from Charlie's anthropological texts, the ones he'd been pouring over, the ones from the Forks Public Library, of all places, right there in the open. Images over the door of the La Push gas station and general store. Carvings on the prows of the cedar canoes.

She sat up with a gasp.

 _WOLF._

* * *

 _Thank you for reading. Please review! I'll send you a preview._

 _Questions..._

 _1\. I tried hard to create new settings. Do you have an opinion about Old Quil's garden, Embry's mom's house, and/or Sam's_ _house? I hope you could picture them._

 _2\. I also tried to create new characters or versions of SM's characters. What do you think of Tiffany, Emily, Claire, Allison, Clara, and Ellen? Did you have a favorite?_

 _3\. What is your opinion of Bella's sleuthing? Do you think it fits with my version of her, or is she suddenly smarter than is believable? How is the chapter doing at presenting that, basically?_

 _4\. Why do you think the wolf showed itself to Bella?_

 _5\. Favorite moments or scenes? Funny parts? I hope this gave you a smile._

 _Please write. Thanks. Reading your comments always makes my day and inspires me to keep going. I hope to hear from_ _you! And I'll send you a preview of Chapter 6!_


	6. Detective Swan and the Chief of Police

**Chapter Six**

 **"Detective Swan and the Chief of Police"**

"I'm going to visit Vera after school," Bella said virtuously on Friday morning. It was a dreary day. The clouds were a heavy, steely gray, and she could easily imagine the quiet splash of raindrops filling up her truck bed. There was something wrong with the tailgate, and rainwater didn't drain anymore unless she put it all the way down.

Charlie, sitting across from her at the table and eating a bowl of raisin bran, did not respond.

"I haven't seen her in a couple weeks," she continued. "She's very old, and very lonely, and I'd like to cheer her up. I think I'll stay for dinner." _I think I'll go to La Push,_ she was thinking. _I think I'll stay there till after dinner time._

Charlie was entirely uninterested in whatever she felt like doing. He washed his bowl, drained his coffee cup, washed that, too, put on his jacket, and stood waiting for her on the porch. She slung her backpack over her shoulder and followed with her keys jingling in her hand, and as she stepped outside he held out his own hand with a look that said, I'll take those, thank you very much.

 _Shit._

Bella dropped her keys into his palm and rode to school in the front seat of the cruiser. At least he didn't turn on the siren this time.

Sitting in her classes that day, Bella avoided the glances of classmates who wondered aloud, "What is that smell?" She had done her best to get rid of the skunk stink with an extra long shower and more baking soda and hydrogen peroxide, but she still smelled faintly sour. Therefore she had put her crappiest clothes: a ripped, black, long-sleeved T-shirt and the enormous denim tent of a skirt she had worn when she'd had that stinging road rash. The top half of her outfit screamed, Rebel, rebel, you tore your dress, and the bottom half screamed, Get in the minivan, kids, or we'll be late for gymnastics. "What is that?" her classmates kept whispering. "Do you smell that?" Bella kept her expression neutral and her mouth shut. She had more important matters to consider.

How was she going to find Jacob? While her teachers lectured, she struggled through various schemes. Should she call Emily? She seemed friendly, so maybe she'd be willing to talk. Should she stake out the La Push School? Jacob had to return there eventually. Should she stake out his house? This seemed like the best plan, but Billy was a liability. Billy might tell her to go away. No visitors he had told her when he said Jake had mono. And what about that mono? Could it be real? And how was she going to get her truck keys back?

 _"Dime sobre el tiempo actual,"_ Mrs. Goff was saying. "Isabella."

"Huh?"

 _"¿Hace frío? ¿Hace calor? ¿Esta lloviendo?"_

 _"¿Repita, por favor?"_

 _"El tiempo,"_ Mrs. Goff said, gesturing toward the window of the Spanish classroom. A dozen students turned to look at her. The classroom's window was curtained in festive orange and red colors; there was a piñata burro hanging from the ceiling and a small banner of flags from Spanish-speaking nations draped along the top of the white board. From the bored expressions on the students' faces, she guessed that this was a softball of a question.

"Uhhhh... _¿Son las once y media?"_

Yes, said Mrs. Goff, it was eleven thirty. But what about the weather?

 _"Son llorando."_

 _"Gracias, Isabella."_

Someone snickered, and Bella dropped her gaze to her textbook. Why was this so hard? Oh, yeah. She had zombied her way through nearly half a year of instruction and it was hard to come back from that kind of deficit.

 _Macho gracias, Eduardo._

At lunchtime, she wanted to talk with Angela about the Jake problem, but things were blurry now. Was he simply sick? Or was he in Sam's gang now, in Sam's thrall?

 _I think I'm next_ , Quil had said. And he was scared.

What was Sam up to? Gathering a cult to worship his magical Quileute wolf-monster?

Yes, it was the wolf-monster than made everything blurry. Of course she couldn't talk to anyone about that; they'd think she was crazy. And Sam had attempted to swear her to silence, saying that otherwise she would hurt Jacob. She imagined Jacob in a cage in the forest, a cage made out of tree limbs and vines, like something out of a King Kong movie. Maybe Sam was going to fatten him up and feed him to the monster. Or maybe he was forcing Jake and Embry to hunt squirrels night and day to feed it. Or maybe they were trying to fight magic with magic. What the heck kind of magic would that be? A magic spell? Could they be wrapped up in some kind of ritual to appease it? Or make it go away?

All of these ideas seemed stupid.

"You okay?" said Angela. She was sitting across from her, eating a red apple. Mike and Jessica shared their table. They, too, were looking at her.

"Sorry," she said. "Just daydreaming."

In gym class, she and Angela were paired with other students who were sliding toward the bottom of the badminton tournament pyramid, having lost their re-match against Mike and Cody a few days ago. Now Angela watched Cody out of the corner of her eye. He and Mike high-fived one another with their racquets after each point, stalking over the varnished pine floor, shoulders loose, their grins easy and smug. He shook his sweaty, curly, red hair and said, "Woo!" and Angela made a pained expression, like she was having a stomach cramp, and forced herself to look away. The white birdie zinged back and forth across the net as Bella leaned left and right, trying to reach it, and Angela ran back and forth behind her, picking up the pieces. At one point, Bella actually returned a serve, having held her racquet up to protect her face as the birdie flew toward her. It bounced off perfectly. Angela laughed, her voice rich and sweet and loud, and Cody stopped and stared at her. A birdie bounced off the side of his head, causing Mike to say, "What the fuck, man?" and Coach Clapp to say, "No foul... language," a joke which only he found funny.

Later in the locker room, Bella said, "He was totally looking at you."

"I am going to catch me a man," Angela whispered, glancing nervously at the other girls.

"You can't catch a man," said Bella.

"Shh!"

More quietly, she hissed, "You can't catch men. First off, he's a boy, a kind of doofy one, and second, you are not a cowgirl."

They were sitting on the wooden benches, changing out of their white tennis shoes, white T-shirts, and green shorts. Bella redressed in her crummiest clothes while Angela pulled on black leggings and shrugged into a rose-colored tunic sweater.

"I'm going to catch one. Quil. Or him."

"Well, who do you like better?"

"I don't know."

"Is this about Ben?"

"You smell kind of funny. It's faint, but... it's kind of...skunky?"

Lauren walked past. "You mean 'skanky.'"

Bella just raised an eyebrow at her. Ever since Jess and Mike had reunited, the wind had gone out of Lauren's sails. Or the venom had gone out of her little snakebites. A nice, solid, "Whatever," from Bella or Angela was enough to make her move on.

"Skunky," repeated Angela.

Bella rolled eyes and explained what had happened yesterday. Angela asked a lot of questions, so many that they arrived at Mrs. Kranz's door before Bella realized that Angela had not answered her question.

* * *

When school was over, Bella walked out to the pick up and drop off lane. There was Charlie, motor running, his face expressionless. She got in the cruiser and he pulled out of the lot, turning right on Main Street instead of left toward their house.

"Where are we going?"

"You said you wanted to visit your old lady friend."

 _Double shit._

He left her on the doorstep of Olympic Acres. It was still raining, so she had no choice but to enter the building. The receptionist smiled when she saw her. "Long time, no see!" she said brightly. "How are you?" "Fine," grumbled Bella. She stalked down the hall to Vera and Albertine's room, then stood leaning on the wall outside their door, trying to sort through her emotions.

Did she want to see Vera? Was Vera her rival? Was one of them "the other woman" in Edward's life? If so, Bella feared it was her. It made her feel angrier than ever. _I am not a side chick,_ she thought, clenching her fists. At the same time, she felt an aching compassion for another life destroyed by abandonment. Letting her head loll back against the wall, she stared at the white, speckled ceiling tiles and the long tubes of florescent lights and contemplated walking home two miles in the rain.

Suddenly, a woman shouted, "Look, it's Bella! Bella's back!"

Albertine was hurrying toward her, coming from the direction of the community room with a basket of yarn cradled against her stomach. A couple doors opened and old ladies she had never met stuck their heads out and said, "Ooh, it's Bella! Where have you been, honey?" One of them came out and banged on Mr. Horowitz's door, saying, "Reggie! Hey, it's Bella!" and when the door opened, Mr. Horowitz rolled out in his wheelchair and slapped her hip, saying, "Ha! Ha, ha, ha! How you holding up, girlie?" They surrounded her in a cloud of pink flowery housecoats, fluffy slippers, wrinkly faces, sparkling eyes, and gnarled hands, patting her everywhere, gently herding her into Vera's room.

There was Vera, asleep, half smothered under Albertine's many mauve afghans. Bella was surprised by the change in her appearance.

The skin on her face was paler, thinner, and more papery than ever. The bridge of her nose and her cheekbones were more prominent, almost shining through her skin in white relief. Her eyelids were dark, and her tiny, sparse eyelashes were marked with yellow. Her white, tufty hair seemed thinner, and her hands, where they lay across her chest, were wrinkled, spotted, pale, and knobby, stiff perhaps with arthritis, and folded in the same manner as hands on a corpse lying still and white in a coffin. The little deer from her crystal animal collection was clasped to her heart where a lily would belong. Mr. Horowitz, Albertine, and the neighbor ladies barely breathed as they watched her.

"She misses you," whispered Albertine. Holding a finger to her lips and saying to the little crowd, "Don't startle her," she crept closer and gently tugged on Vera's wrist, trying to rearrange her hands. Vera woke up then. Without opening her eyes, she croaked, "I'm practicing."

Ohhhhh!" scolded the ladies, clucking their tongues.

"Go away," croaked Vera.

The ladies shuffled out, grumbling things like, "Ought to ashamed of herself," and "Not funny." One said, "Poor thing," and looked appealingly at Bella for reasons Bella could not guess. Mr. Horowitz rolled out, too, but first he slapped Bella's hip again and said, "Go get 'em, tiger."

Albertine fluttered her hand at the chair beside Vera's bed and perched cautiously on her own while Bella sat down. In the silence that settled again, Bella looked at Vera, who returned her hands to their crossed position and exhaled so deeply that her chest visibly sunk.

"Oh, she misses you so much!" chirped Albertine. "You can see how excited she is to see you."

"Shut up," said Vera.

Albertine lifted a mauve, half-finished creation from her knitting basket and began to work on it, her silver needles clicking. "It's a hat. I'm trying to get Vera to wear a hat."

"Fuck hats."

"Vera feels strongly about hats."

Yes, thought Bella, she could tell. She took off her coat—Leah's raincoat, really, since her red one was probably still soaked and muddy in a plastic bag in Sam's backyard where she'd forgotten it—and glanced at the thermostat. It was much warmer in here than usual. The monitor said it was set at seventy-eight degrees.

"Wouldn't you like to sit up and visit with Bella?" Albertine pressed a button on Vera's bed frame, and slowly the top half of the mattress began to rise. When it got to a forty-five degree angle, Vera, eyes still shut, pressed a different button to lower herself.

It had been two weeks since Bella had visited Olympic Acres. She glanced around the room. On the table by the window, Albertine had left her red glassware on display, and Vera's glass dome still covered her crystal animals. There were maybe a few more bodice-busting romance novels on the wicker bookcase and a few more afghans on Vera's bed. Bella could hardly see the outline of her feet through all the layers. The photos of Albertine's eleven grandkids still smiled from the walls, and the many bottles of Vera's pills still sat on their tray on her bedside table. It seemed a sad contrast suddenly: the things Albertine had there, and the things Vera had.

She looked at the old lady lying flat and mute. "Hi," she began. It was like talking to a plant. "How have you been?"

Vera was so still that Bella watched the blankets over her chest until she saw them rise slightly with her breath.

"Me, I'm okay. I guess."

Albertine quietly rocked in her chair.

"I got grounded."

Bella thought she detected a flicker of interest on Vera's face.

Talking to her was _not_ like talking to a plant, Bella decided half an hour later. It was like talking to a diary. She created a story. It was essentially a severely edited account of her life these past two weeks. She talked about her father's dislike for her former boyfriend and the trouble she was in for sneaking around with him. It felt really, really uncomfortable to talk to Vera about Edward, wondering about Edward's feelings for the old woman and how his feelings for _her_ compared. _If only you knew..._ she thought, staring at Vera's purple, sunken eyelids. _Would we comfort one another? Would you hate me? Or would the news shock and pain you?_ Vera's pulse flickered in her skinny neck. _Would it shock and pain you fatally?_ Bella was strongly leaning toward not ever talking about that!

Instead, she talked also about her best friend, and how she had been thinking of him as her new boyfriend. But he hadn't spoken to her in two weeks. Something was wrong, she said. He needed her help because someone was keeping him from her.

"Sweetie," said Albertine, "are you sure he wants to see you again? Maybe you should spend your love on another boy."

No, said Bella. She didn't want another boy; she wanted him. And she knew that something was wrong, wrong, wrong. She needed to help him. She had been to his house, she said, and it was an unnatural mess. His friends hadn't seen him in days and days. His father had unplugged their phone.

"His father has sold him to the Gypsies," said Albertine.

Vera may or may not have smirked.

This is not funny, said Bella. She had spent a couple hours yesterday trying to find him, stomping through the wet woods, asking at his friends' houses, getting rained on, sliding down a muddy hill with her boyfriend's giant pal who kept tripping on her, hiding from her father while she wished to pry information out of an antagonist's girlfriend—

"Sneaking around on your daddy again?" said Albertine. "You are a bad girl."

—"I am not"—and getting sprayed by nine skunks.

At this Albertine laughed out loud. Vera frowned harder than ever, probably to suppress a smile.

"How many, did you say?" said Albertine? "Ten?"

"Nine."

"Hey, Reggie!" Albertine hollered into the hall. "She got sprayed by ten skunks."

"A dozen skunks?" hollered Mr. Horowitz.

Aurelia Tisdale, Tyler Crowley's mom, came down the hall with a pile of fresh white towels in her arms. The nurse poked her head into Vera and Albertine's room and said, "There better not be anybody bringing skunk smell in here."

"It was yesterday," said Bella.

"You go wash yourself," said Ms. Tisdale. "I can still smell you."

"I already did! I washed with ketchup and everything!"

"My nose doesn't lie. I can smell you from here."

"I am not stinky! Not very stinky." She looked at Albertine. "Not stinky?"

With an apologetic cringe, Albertine pinched a centimeter of air with her index finger and thumb.

Out in the hall, she could hear the old ladies opening their doors. "What's going on?" said one. Another said, "Bella got sprayed by twenty skunks!"

"You can't even get twenty skunks in one place!" shouted Bella. She walked to the door, leaned into the hall, and shouted, "That's impossible!"

"Twenty skunks in one place!" said an old lady in a blue striped bathrobe. "Do they live in colonies? Or nests? Like snakes?"

"Snakes don't live in nests," said another lady.

"Oh, yes, they do," said a third lady. "Some do. They hibernate in big squirming messes underground, like noodles."

"Did you wake up a nest of skunks?" said Ms. Tisdale. "Why would you do that?"

"I'm going home," said Bella. "Excuse me." She picked up the phone on Vera's bedside table and dialed the station. Charlie answered. "Please come and get me," she said.

"I'm working."

"I'm being attacked. There are like, six people attacking me here."

"I'm sure you're perfectly safe. See you after dinner."

"Dinner?"

"'I think I'll stay for dinner.' That's what you said."

 _Triple shit._

She said goodbye before she hung up on him because she didn't feel like getting in any more trouble.

"Is your daddy coming?" said Albertine.

"No."

"Oh, good. You can stay for dinner. We're having tomato soup!"

All the old ladies laughed.

Vera pressed the button to raise herself to a sitting position. "Arabian Nights," she croaked. "Ali Bella and the Forty Skunks."

"Nine," she sighed. "Only nine."

"Forty-nine skunks."

There was no way for Bella to win. Reggie and the old ladies crowded into the room to tease her, and they ended up staying for an hour, trading long-ago stories of kids and dogs sprayed by skunks. Some were envious of Ellen Uley, whom Bella said she blamed for this whole problem. "I wish I had a pet," said one lady. Her name was June. She was the one who knew that snakes can hibernate in colonies. She had been an elementary school teacher before she retired, right around the time Bella was born.

How amazing, thought Bella, that she could fit her entire life into the time that this one person, June, had spent being retired. Measuring her young life against the Cullens' vampire-lives didn't feel the same, perhaps because the Cullens were just stopped at one point, in the physical growth and changes that a body would endure... or enjoy? These women had aged through life stages. Falling in love. Parenthood. Grieving losses. Seeing a child go to college. Seeing a grandchild born. Even burying a spouse. As Bella sat quietly by the wall, she began to think that the life of an old, old woman was not rich like the Cullens', with their beauty and fancy houses, cars and clothes, but nevertheless rich in a human way.

 _Do I want that?_

Dinner was tomato soup, salad, pasta with vegetables, and small squares of pale pink, overcooked salmon. She sat at a big round table with a white linen cloth, surrounded by Albertine, Vera, Reggie, June, and half a dozen other ladies. She tried to catch their names, most of them sounding woefully unstylish by today's standards: Florence. Dorothy. Harriet. Phyllis. Gladys. Alma. They talked a lot. They waited for a staff member to come around with a tray of chocolate sheet cake. Feeling like a prop or a favorite doll, Bella sat between Vera and Albertine with little to say. They talked over and through her. But Vera was talking, she noticed, even if she had a negative and sometimes profane opinion about most things—"Full of shit," she croaked at one point, and "Fuck salmon," at another—and she ate a few bites of each thing on her plate.  
Around seven o'clock, Ms. Tisdale tapped Bella on the shoulder, saying that her father was waiting in the lobby. "Goodbye, Bella," chorused the ladies. "Come again, sweetie." Heat rose to her cheeks at the unexpected attention. She waved goodbye awkwardly and started down the hall. Before she reached the lobby, however, a voice behind her said, "Girlie. Wait." Mr. Horowitz had followed her.

He stopped his wheelchair beside her and searched her face with his hard, blue eyes. "It's good you came back," he said quietly. "Vera doesn't do well when people go away without saying goodbye."

His words sent a tiny arrow of recognition and guilt through her heart, making her tear up.

"I see you understand. Thank you."

* * *

Charlie was extremely pissed off when he picked her up.

"What's wrong?" she said.

"Wait till we get home."

So she stood beside him nervously as he stopped at the Golden Gate restaurant for Chinese takeout. "Would you like to see a menu?" said the woman at the counter.

"I'd like whatever is available for immediate takeout."

They went home with three white paper cartons: rice, lemon chicken, and Mongolian beef with pea pods. In the kitchen, Charlie dumped some of each onto his plate and dug in with a fork. Bella tried to stay out of the way as he opened a drawer, got out his magic markers, pulled his hand-drawn Olympic Peninsula map from the top of the refrigerator, and spread it one the table.

"Loo' this," he mumbled through his food, choking it down rapidly. With a red X, he marked a spot just north of Hoquiam.

"Another hiker?" she cried. "Killed? Oh, no!"

"An old, unsolved murder case. With large paw prints." He made a red marking for the prints, too, and drew a dotted line from the mark of Waylon's death near Forks to the animal sighting in the Queets River valley to these new marks near Hoquiam, completing the bottom third of the bow shape he'd been forming. "And get this," he added, passing her a newspaper article. It looked to be scanned and printed from a microfiche file, the blur and wrinkle of the newsprint slightly visible.

 _Local Educator Found Dead_ , read the title.

 _The body of Hoquiam High School Vice Principal Gerald Hinkley was found yesterday morning in a wooded area north of Hoquiam. Police suspect either an animal attack or foul play due to the condition of the body, which was severely mutilated._

 _"I wasn't sure what I was looking at at first," said Frank Holmes of Aberdeen, who spotted the body while hunting elk, and who called the scene "chilling" and "sickening." He expressed a wish for detectives to quickly identify and apprehend the perpetrator or perpetrators responsible. The perpetrator, however, may be an animal. Large paw prints, likely belonging to a bear, were found at the scene. Detectives aren't ruling out any possibilities at this time._

 _Local hunters have organized a sweep of the forest with intent to eradicate any bears in the area._

 _Meanwhile, those close to the deceased are being interviewed as police seek knowledge of anyone who may have expressed animosity toward the educator. Students at Hoquiam High are "stunned," according to senior class president Donald Kowalski. While the vice principal may not have been a favorite of students, Kowalski avers that "no one would have dreamed of [harming] the guy."_

 _The family of the deceased expressed "shock," "disbelief," and "grief," according to his brother, Garrison Hinkley._

 _Memorial services will be held Sunday at First Episcopalian Church of Hoquiam._

Bella looked up at her father, horrified. The article was dated June 16, 1936, published in the _Hoquiam Herald._ He slipped her another article, dated July 1, 1936.

 _Political Hesitancy to Blame for Lack of Inditement._

This was an opinion column.

 _In view of the murder of Hoquiam High's Vice Principle, Gerald Hinkley, now is the time to re-establish the natural order of society in this state; namely, to keep the Indians confined to the lands preserved for them by treaty and by the generosity of the federal government. These are lawful measures taken to separate the races for the safety and comfort of all and to ensure the wholesome character of our communities._

 _In the weeks following Gerald Hinkley's despicable and callous killing, Hoquiam has failed to recognize the menace of the savage race in our midst. Clearly, the individual apprehended at the scene of the crime is to blame, but authorities sited lack of evidence as grounds—even an imperative—for releasing the only and obvious perpetrator of this crime. Let our law enforcement officials remember the facts: the only person tied in any way to this murder is the so-called chief of a distant and backward Indian tribe from the north coast, apprehended at the scene, kneeling over the deceased with a guilty expression. Obviously drawn to our city looking for economic gain, this Indian—and others like him—have inserted themselves into a society where they do not belong and have nothing to contribute. Indeed, they are a drain on our charity and tolerance, and we have seen the evil with which they reward us._

 _Be vigilant, citizens. Offer no harbor to our enemy. You will know him by his dark skin, tall frame, black hair, hooked, beakish nose, and haughty bearing. Be alert for one Ephraim Black, whose name I do not hesitate to publicize in the knowledge that some stouthearted men in our midst—men who will not be intimidated—will have the courage to do what law enforcement officials are legally—or cowardly—unable to do._

 _—Reverend Thomas P. Goodwin, Hoquiam, WA_

Bella was appalled. Who would publish this racist shit? Were things really that bad in the thirties? Was this a man of GOD who said these things? And what about this Ephraim guy? Had he been lynched?

"This is horrible!" she blurted.

Charlie laughed. It was a strange, barking, mad-scientist kind of laugh which made Bella shrink from him. "This is horrible?" he laughed. "This is Billy."

"What?"

"Billy Black. It's his grandfather."

"What?"

"Your boy Jacob's great grandfather."

"How is this connected?"

"Oh, Bella. You have some explaining to do."

He pulled a manila file folder thick with printouts from his briefcase, saying that while his deputy Steve Dorsic was too spooked to go in the woods lately, he was certainly not afraid of books. Dorsic had spent weeks combing through a hundred years worth of newspapers in the basements of public libraries all over the Olympic Peninsula, looking for incidents of animal attacks. Eventually he found these gems in the _Hoquiam Herald._ And Charlie, always thorough, asked him to print out everything for two years before and after these events.

Bella felt the blood drain from her face.

"Oh, I don't know whether to laugh or cry," he said. "Probably cry. I'll cry about this tomorrow; thank God I have the day off."

He spread an assortment of articles over the map in front of her. In a jumbled chronology, she saw the closure of Hoquiam Hardware and Mercantile; the Moss family's bankruptcy; obituaries for John, Judith, Bertram, and the infant Milton Moss; an engagement announcement—awkwardly brief, but socially obligatory—for Vera Moss and Edgar Culpepper; the logging accident that killed Bertram Moss and injured Reginald Horowitz and a dozen other men; Bertram's piano donated to his church after his memorial service; The Quinault Lumber Company's employment records showing Ephraim Black, Edgar Culpepper, Bertram Moss, and Reginald Horowitz assigned to the same crew; a contract for Dr. Charles Culpepper, hired as a surgeon at the neighboring Aberdeen General Hospital; articles about the urgent search for a physician to replace Dr. Culpepper after his sudden departure on June 14, 1936—"My deepest apologies," began his resignation letter—; and Esther Culpepper's blue ribbon lilacs at the Grays Harbor County Fair in May of 1935. There was a picture of Esme and the flowers.

"Ha!" said Charlie. "Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha! I'm going out of my mind!"

"Shh," said Bella. "Take a deep breath."

Instead Charlie got up and put away the leftover Chinese food, his map, and his magic markers. His hands were shaking.  
"Crazy, blood-sucking sociopaths! I'm going to need to interview more witnesses! And you know who's still alive? Who Dorsic tracked down?"

"Uh..."

"Reginald Horowitz and Vera Moss."

 _Quadruple shit._

"Your god-damned history project partner. Haven't you spent six weeks writing that woman's biography?"

Bella stared at the articles on the table. _Part of being a Cullen is being meticulously responsible,_ Alice had said. Apparently they learned that after their disastrous stay in Hoquiam.

"And you didn't think to mention this?" said Charlie. "Whose side are you on?"

"Well, what am I going to say?" she cried, standing, shoving her chair back. "Huh? My whole life revolves around a vampire? He leaves town and I still have to hear about him from a wrinkly old prune who almost married him?"

"Yes!" said Charlie. His eyes were glittering with adrenaline. "What the hell! Say exactly that!"

"I didn't even know! I found out two weeks ago!"

Charlie paused. "But you went to Hoquiam more than a month ago. You probably saw some of these same articles when you did your assignment."

Bella looked at him mutely.

"Edgar Culpepper. Edward Cullen. Sparkly-ass eternal flame who likes to live in cloudy places and jilt girls. You didn't connect the dots?"

"Well, I—" She tried to make this admission sound dignified by standing up straighter: "Mr. Horowitz explained it. Two weeks ago."

Charlie looked at her blankly for a moment, then paced to the sink and stared out the window, pinching the bridge of his nose hard. Although the church Bella's grandmother had attended with the Webers was Lutheran, it seemed that when Charlie was young, her grandmother had tried to raise him as a Catholic. _"O my God,"_ he muttered, and she could tell by his earnest pauses that he was trying to speak from deep memory, _"I am heartfully sorry for having offended Thee, and I detest all my sins because of Thy just punishment..."_ It was a long prayer that made her feel vaguely uncomfortable. She looked over her shoulder.

When he came back he gently prodded her into her chair. "Bella," he began, pulling another chair out and sitting in front of her, taking her hands. He turned them palm up as if he could read something there that would help him. "Sweetie. Look. Let's just consider _everything_ important enough to tell me. As soon as you figure it out."

"Okay..."

"People are in danger. People have died. Cullens don't eat people, you say, but somebody out there does. And we haven't caught that somebody yet."

"You can't catch them," she began. "They're too fast, too—"

"We have to try. We can't do nothing. And just today, we lost two more hikers."

"No!" Tears came to her eyes. She wanted to pull her hands away, but he wouldn't let go.

"This is very, very important. A young man and woman have gone missing. The man is a college student who grew up here, and his parents say he went backpacking with a young woman he met recently on the internet. He was last seen two days ago. The young woman is missing, too, but we don't know anything about her, where she's from, what's her name, what she looks like... We got nothing. His Facebook account is linked to hers, but hers has been deleted. Now we need to get some kind of lead, some kind of new information that can get us farther along in this investigation. Something new—anything—could help."

In a very small voice, she said, "Is it Riley?"

"Riley Biers. You know him?"

"My friend," she managed.

Charlie squeezed her hands.

She swallowed hard and said, "There's a giant wolf in the woods."

* * *

That night, she lay awake for a long time, listening to the rain on the roof.

She had fished Riley's cell phone number out of her backpack. He had given it to her at the library. _The last time I saw him..._ She dialed the number and her call went to voicemail immediately: "Hi, leave a message," was all he had recorded. No wordy "...and I'll return your call as soon as possible," formality. Not even his name. Just his voice: friendly, casual, honey-colored. She didn't know why she thought of his voice as honey-colored, but it was. She called several times, hearing, "Hi, leave a message," until tears rolled down her face. "Be safe," she whispered after the beep. "Hold on." Then she called Angela, who also cried to hear the news. Angela said she would pray for him. She didn't have to say that she feared the worst.

Rain pattered on the roof all night. She knew this because she kept waking from shallow dreams of running through the woods, sometimes with Edward, and sometimes from Edward. Everything was green and silent, the sound of her footfalls absorbed by moss. Sometimes she ran from Sam. Sometimes from a massive, shapeless, furry animal with moon-white canines and a body of hot musk. In other dreams, she felt she was Riley, running from an unknown terror with pale, granite skin and red eyes.

Waking, she saw him still, remembering the golden curls beneath the green ball cap he wore, the way he re-laced his hiking boots, the way he'd managed to buy her a milkshake despite her stiff insistence that he not. He was a stinker. She saw him with his arm around the back of Angela's chair, teaching her to flip nondairy creamer cups at the diner, watching Quil covertly, making Angela feel pretty. Feel important and wanted. She saw him wet with rain, having run back to Newton's to get his car, and standing in the rain again to open her door when he'd driven her home. She saw him smirking at her in the library parking lot because she had rushed out of the house in her pajamas. She was late, and he had waited for her for an hour. She saw him talking about wanting to be a teacher, remembered that he'd listed "summers off" twice as a career benefit. And she saw him with his hands in his pockets in the windy, chilly library parking lot, after he'd given her his phone number and confessed that he wasn't helping her merely to be nice. He knew she had a boyfriend. But he was still thinking about her.

Oh, Bella had said. What else could she say? She had given him her hand, intending that a formal shake would conclude their business relationship. But he had pressed her fingers warmly and said, Bye, Bella.

In the deep morning dark, around four a.m., Bella woke from yet another dream of Riley running in the forest. She rolled onto her stomach and sobbed as quietly as she could, pressing a corner of her pillow against her mouth.

Toward dawn she gave up on sleeping and smeared her hands over her face, wiping at her tears, her sweat, and her anxiety. Oh, God, Riley and his friend could be dead by now. But she still had one other worry: Charlie hadn't been as surprised about the wolf as she thought he would be.

* * *

Saturday morning. She cried in the shower, tears mingling with the water on her face, and she cried at the table, trying to eat a bowl of cereal. Charlie asked her to tell him everything she could about Riley, and she gave him the phone number and said that the woman he'd gone hiking with, the one he'd met on Facebook, had red hair and could speak French. Also, she said that she'd met him when he bought a pair of hiking boots from Newton's.

"What kind of boots?"

"Asolos. The Stynger ones. Red and black. He was a ten and a half."

Charlie said that was very helpful. Very, very helpful.

"Really?"

He patted her shoulder, grabbed his briefcase, drove her to Newton's for her morning shift, and came inside with her to buy a pair of the hiking boots in Riley's size. He said he was going to make a plaster cast of the boot treads at the station and then drive the boots themselves to Port Angeles for Joe Carrington. The Port Angeles Chief of Police was going to head this investigation since Riley had told his parents he'd be hiking on the Bogachiel Peak trail, just east of Lake Crescent.

 _His parents,_ thought Bella. _His poor parents._

Charlie said Joe Carrington had called in the FBI and told Charlie to get some sleep. I command you to get some sleep, is what he'd said. Charlie repeated this to Bella with a laugh.

"Well, maybe you should," she replied.

Charlie grimaced. Standing with Bella in the shoe section, he stared at the boots for a long moment. Then he rubbed his hand over her hair to say goodbye. At the front counter, he bought the boots from Mrs. Newton and told her about Riley's being missing. Mrs. Newton put her hands over her mouth and nose and said, "No. Oh, no, no, no." Charlie pulled a flyer with Riley's picture on it from his briefcase and asked Mrs. Newton to hang it in the window. "Yes, of course," she said. Her face was pale. Charlie called to Bella that he'd be back at one o'clock.

Bella cleaned Newton's customer restroom, took the sweaty sleeping bag she had messed up a couple weeks ago out to her truck, and sat in the shoe section after she'd finished her other chores. In her hands, she held an Asolo Stynger men's boot, size ten and a half. She turned it over and over, studying the pattern of the treads: a shape like a double horseshoe, curved lines on the heel, and a high arch with a steel shank. Never before, in any class, for any test, had she wanted to memorize something so bad.

* * *

After work, Bella made lunch for herself while Charlie took a nap. She did some homework. After an hour or so, Charlie came downstairs. Like his daughter, he was good at compartmentalizing when necessary. His colleague commanded him to rest? Well, he'd try. Maybe that's why his eyes weren't red as he read the comics in the paper, trying to put a smile on his face. Bella closed her physics book, armed herself with a pad of paper and a pencil, and decided to continue her own investigation.

First she called Jacob's home. It rang and rang until she gave up.

 _Jacob,_ she wrote. _No answer. Phone probably still unplugged._

Next she called Quil. His mother answered the phone.

"Bella! Hi. How are you?"

"Fine. Is Quil there?"

"He's sleeping. Not feeling well, actually. He's got a fever."

"Oh, no. I'm sorry. Tell him I called?"

"Sure, sure. Put your dad on the phone, please."

 _Quintuple Shit._

Charlie talked to Joy long enough for Bella to leave the room, disgusted. She pulled a load of laundry out of the dryer on the back porch, folded it, and put it all away upstairs. When she returned, Charlie was whistling as he washed the dishes.  
Frowning at his back, she wrote, _Quil_ , on her pad. _Fever._

That was funny. Jacob had had a fever, or at least his skin had felt unusually warm, after their night at the movies. She, Angela, and Mike had all come down with the flu within a day or two. Could the germs have taken two weeks to affect to Quil?

A phone call to Leah's house yielded no more information than the girls had gained on Thursday, which was pretty much nothing. However, Leah did say that she'd rescued Bella's coat from Sam's backyard and washed it for her.

"Thank you."

"You should stake out his house," said Leah.

"I'm grounded. More grounded than before. He even took my keys."

Charlie, still washing dishes, switched the tune he was whistling to one that sounded suspiciously like, "Zip-a-Dee-Doo-Dah."

"You want me to come bust you out?" said Leah.

"Constant surveillance," she replied. At the same time she heard Sue in the background calling Leah's name.

"What?!" Leah hollered. Bella wished she would put her hand over the receiver. "What?! Now?!" There was a pause, and then Leah said, "Okay." She told Bella that her mom had just informed her that they were all going up to Neah Bay to visit her aunt; otherwise she would have gone to stake out Jacob's house herself.

Thanks anyway, said Bella. She hung up the phone and wrote, _Leah. Out of commission._

A scrap of paper on the counter caught her eye. It was in her father's handwriting. _Uley,_ it said. _555-9837._ Charlie finished up at the sink and went upstairs (hopefully not to put on cologne, she thought), so before she could talk herself out of it, she dialed the number. When the phone was answered, all she heard was a fit of coughing. Then a silence.

"Hello?" she began.

More silence.

"Um, is Emily there?"

"She's outside washing the house," was the creaky reply.

"Washing the— Wait, what?"

"Washing the house. The back wall. Who wants to know?"

"It's Bella?"

"Is that your name?"

"Yes?"

"You don't sound too sure. I ask you a question and you say your own name like there's a question mark at the end of your sentence."

Bella was beginning to regret this call. "Can I just talk to Emily?"

"I don't know. Can you?"

"Is this Ellen?"

"You can call me Mrs. Great Great Grandmother Uley. And you are a stupid girl. You play with fire. My boy saved your hide. And you broke my great-great-granddaughter's tiny little heart, you—"

A man's voice could be heard in the background: "Grammy, it was me. I had to do it."

"—stupid girl."

Bella frowned. Was she talking about Claire? Where was the math involved in that? The girl was Emily's niece, no relation. But she supposed Sam's great-grandma had claimed her. They'd probably bonded over stripeys and toast. Well, wasn't that just fantastic?

"Ellen, could I—"

"Mrs. Great Great Grandmother Uley."

"Sorry. Mrs. Great Great Grandmother Uley, could I—"

"No."

The line went dead. Bella stared indignantly at the receiver before adding to her list. _Ellen Uley. Mean old lady. Hates me, why?_

In Old Quil's garden on Thursday, Sam had said, _There are worse things than vampires in the world._ So clearly Sam knows about vampires. He almost certainly knew what Edward was when he found her in the forest that night, when she'd been so terribly lost. How on earth had Sam found her? What did he mean about worse things than vampires? Oh, God, was he referring to his wolf monster? In her dream last night, a dim memory had returned to her, a memory of a chuffing, sniffing sound and the warm breath of an animal flowing over her as she lay crumpled on the ground. Then Sam was there. Maybe he had directed his monster to sniff her out and then mercifully restrained it from eating her.

Of course! He did control it! He had spoken to it on Thursday to make it leave!

 _WM definitely Sam's pet/weapon,_ she wrote.

Why is this happening to me, she thought. More and more secrets to keep. And more importantly, where did the monster come from and how did Sam come to be its master? She tried to cull through her memories, things Edward had said, things Billy or Jake or even Sam had let slip, and she recalled that on the evening of her junior prom, Billy had blackmailed his son—with the promise of car parts—to deliver to Edward a cryptic message which Jacob had chalked up to his father's superstitions and recited with a roll of his eyes: "We'll be watching."

"We," as in plural?

Maybe the wolf monster didn't belong to Sam alone. Surely Billy had a hand in it. Billy spent plenty of time at Jake's birthday party telling Sam what to do, mostly regarding Paul and some kind of "job" that he thought Sam wasn't doing well enough. A "job?" That sounded vaguely like the mafia. Maybe the wolf monster was like the Quileute community hit man. Or at least an illegal pet. Or a science-magic experiment gone dangerously crazy.

So why would they make a wolf monster in the first place? She tried to doodle a few ideas but saw that she'd need a lot more paper. Up in her room, she found her journal. The more she wrote, the more her thoughts fell into place.

 _Fact #1: Embry knows the "bear" in the woods is not a bear. Conjecture: Embry might not have meant that it's a vampire. Embry might have meant the WM._

 _Fact #2: The WM found me when I was lost. Conjecture: WM can sniff things like a dog. Like a bloodhound?_

 _Fact #3: Sam bosses around Embry, Paul (poorly), and probably Jared. Sam bosses the WM. Conjecture: Sam is an abnormally bad-ass and/or controlling dude._

 _Fact #4: Billy controls Sam. Conjecture: Billy is a MORE bad-ass and/or controlling dude. And if Billy controls Sam, then he also indirectly controls Embry, Paul, Jared, and the WM._

Well! This wasn't the first time she'd thought that Billy had his finger in everyone's pie. And if he was controlling Embry, or at least allowing his older son to be controlled by Sam, then Billy might allow Jacob to get messed up in that as well.  
Billy was starting to creep her out. He'd meddled in her relationship with Edward (for good reason, she acknowledged), and scared her with the flash of his temper when he'd grabbed her arm and yelled at her. He'd exploded with anger at Jacob, too, that night they'd gone into the woods for stargazing. Maybe because he was the chief, he thought it was okay to boss everyone around. Now, with the WM, his power was amplified. Magically amplified with magisterial, messed-up, monstrous magic.

 _Mind-boggling._

She wished there were some kind of counter-magic to make this go away, like throwing a bucket of salt over a grease fire.

Having no other avenue toward finding Jacob, she went downstairs and dialed Sam's number again, hoping that someone other than Ellen would answer and preparing to hang up if necessary.

"Hello?" said a little voice.

 _Claire!_ What luck!

"Hi, sweetie," said Bella. "How are you?"

"Three."

"No, not how old are you. Just how are you doing?"

"I'm three."

"Okay. That's nice. Can I please talk to Emily?"

"She washing house. Stinky house."

"Ohhh..." Bella tried to sound like she knew all about that. "Well, do you think she would like a break? Maybe you could tell her that she has a phone call."

"She has phone."

"Good enough."

She heard a soft bump, which she imagined was Claire's setting the receiver on a counter or table. There was a long pause, and then faintly she could hear an exchange of voices.

"On phone."

"Phone call for me? Who is it?"

"Don't know."

"Well, ask, please."

Claire returned to the phone. "Who is it?"

"It's Bella."

"Bella?" The little girl's voice became higher pitched, almost squeaky. "You! My baby pet!"

"What?"

"You kick her into the garden. Make her fly! So small! I find her, and her neck all floppy, her head rolling around. Her feet running nowhere!"

"Oh. Oh, no. I'm sorry."

"And Sam step on her head! He said it would be better that way. It was not better! Not better!"

"Oh, I'm so sorry. Can I talk to Emily?"

She heard only sniffling and hiccuping.

"I'm really sorry. It was an accident. And you have six others. That's good, right? Six other baby skunks? It's all right."

It was definitely not all right. Claire stood there crying, her breaths sounding like tiny gusts of wind on Bella's end of the line. Bella managed to understand, in the girl's fragmented sentences between sobs, that the baby skunk had been called Jasmine, named after a kitten she'd had in Neah Bay which had been hit by a car. Claire wanted Bella to tell her that Heaven was real. "I'm not sure," said Bella, reflexively, and then she immediately regretted it. She strained to understand Claire's words through her tears. The girl was saying something about burying Jasmine and her shocking, ghastly, squished head in a shoebox under a bush that Sam had promised would make pink flowers in a few weeks, but there were no flowers there now, which was horrible, and that all the boys had come to the funeral—

"The boys?" Bella asked.

"Tared and Paul and Embry and Take."

"Jake?"

"Take. And Paul say, 'Who done this?' and I say, 'Bella,' and he say you dirty cunt, and Take hit him, and all boys leave!"

"Oh, no."

"What's cunt?"

"It's a— A word little kids shouldn't say. Claire, I'm really, really sorry. So sorry. Can I please talk to Emily? I'm really sorry."

It stood to reason, she supposed, that sooner or later someone else in the household would notice a three year old sobbing on the phone. "Who are you talking to?" someone asked. "Bella," said Claire. "Gimme that phone," said the other person.

Sam's mother got on the line. "Look, we don't know you, but you have hurt this little girl. What are you going to do about it, huh?"

"I— I don't know. I didn't know it died. I'm so, so sorry; it was an accident."

"Well, you have accidentally broken enough hearts around here. You don't know what she has gone through, but it's more than a skunk, more than a kitten, let me tell you. When you figure out a way to fix this, you can call again, and not before. So for now you can just go—" Here her voice changed, becoming softer, sweeter: "What's that, honey? Okay."

Claire got back on the phone. "Hate you," she said very quietly, and then she hung up.

Bella replaced the receiver in its cradle. When would she stopped messing things up? _It's like I'm King Midas, but instead of gold, everything I touch turns to shit._ She sat down at the table, put her hands over her face, and let herself cry.

Charlie came downstairs with a load of laundry in a green, plastic basket. He was also freshly showered, she noticed, and wearing a nice sweater and... something scented?

"Aw, Dad."

"What's wrong?"

What on earth could she say? "Everything."

"Everything, how?"

"You wouldn't understand."

"Oh, really?" The laundry basket made a heavy smack when he dropped it on the linoleum, instantly angry. "Vampire boyfriend, old people witnesses, giant wolf-thing in the woods, and you think maybe this is _not_ a time when you ought to tell me what's going on?"

Well, when he put it that way... She got up and held open the door to the back porch with an "after you" expression, and as he loaded the machine and dumped in a cupful of white, powdered soap, she told him about Claire and the baby skunk.

"Ha, ha, ha," said Charlie. "Like, flying? You mean it went flying through the air?"

It wasn't at all funny, she insisted. She was in deep shit with a preschooler, Sam's mom, and a ninety-something-year-old withered tree stump of a witch. But at least she'd gained a little information about Jacob. He was still in La Push and had been well enough to attend a baby skunk's funeral.

"Go back to the skunk part," said Charlie. The thing that interested him was that she had been hiding beneath Sam's dining room window while he interviewed Emily. "And I didn't know you were there," he said slowly. "At least, not at the time." He was also interested in the other places she'd searched that day, the ground she'd covered, the people she'd interviewed, and how close she'd gotten to the wolf monster.

"That's not a good thing," she said.

He just patted her shoulder. "Do you know what a mole is?"

"A little animal. Lives underground. Can't see well. Eats worms."

"Excellent. Let's go to La Push."

* * *

 **Thank you for reading.** I hope you'll review. Please sign in so I can reply to thank you and offer a preview!

A new chapter is coming within a week. Till then, I hope you'll share your thoughts about some of this. I have been getting some VERY good ideas from readers lately, including the idea that Bella is improving her own mental health by focusing on solving the mystery. Thank you, Jibrah! Please keep your ideas coming. What do you think about...

1\. Angela's plan to catch a man, and Bella's question about Ben. Possible? Good idea? Incidentally, have any of you ever tried to catch one? I did. It worked. But I hadn't been specific enough with myself about what I hoped to catch until after I'd caught it. Anywho...

2\. Charlie's "mole" comments...

3\. Vera's reaction to Bella's return...

4\. The conversation with Claire, Ellen Uley, and Allison Uley...

5\. The clues Bella has gathered or attempted to gather about Jake's disappearance...

6\. The clues Charlie has gathered about 1936...

6\. Riley's disappearance... Is it too late to save him, plotwise, do you think?

I hope some of those ideas spark your interest. I, for one, am VERY interested in your feedback. Flames, not so much. (AmandaForks ducks as tomatoes are thrown.) I know I promised that Jacob would reappear in this chapter, and he's not here after all. But that is only because the chapter I wrote was soooooo loooooooong that I had to split it in half to publish it. FF website was cramping. So I made TWO chapters recently. Here's one! Please say hello, readers! And I'll have the next chapter—with Jacob—up within a week!

Yours ever. AF


	7. Chapter 7 Moonlight

**Chapter Seven**

 **"Moonlight"**

Charlie and Bella got ready for date night in La Push. Charlie nodded curtly at his reflection on the lid of the washing machine and puffed out his cheeks. Bella counted to ten before she followed Charlie out the backdoor and locked it behind them. In the driveway, she lowered the tailgate on her truck bed and stepped aside as a small torrent of water gushed out.

"That thing jammed with leaves?" said Charlie.

She looked at the corners where water ought to drain. "I don't think so."

Charlie wanted to drive. The truck sputtered to life when he turned the key, and Bella buckled up in the passenger seat. Cautiously, Charlie depressed the gas pedal, revving the engine, and they sat there in neutral for a minute or two, feeling the rough, irregular idling. When they backed out of the driveway, the truck coughed a tiny cloud of black smoke.

"Wow," said Charlie. "This thing is a piece of shit."

On the way to La Push, Bella stared out the window. Charlie smelled like cinnamon and Old Spice. Joy, he said, was into aromatherapy. Her father was _not_ into aromatherapy; he wanted to make that clear; but he was into Joy, so he had smeared a tiny bit of cinnamon on his neck with the aftershave.

"You what?"

"Joy says cinnamon is an aphrodisiac."

"Aw, come on."

Charlie posited that a good smell was a good smell. When Bella didn't reply, he repeated his words so that they sounded more like a question, and then he mumbled, "I'm not going to the mall to buy fancy stink in a bottle when I can make my own."

"Cologne," she said. "From France. Where people know what smells good."

Charlie drove on in silence. Bella glanced at his face, which was slightly flushed. He did not own any cologne; she was used to his bureau top's spartan appearance when she polished the furniture. But he had used the words "going to the mall," which he probably hadn't said in ten years, even though he prefaced them with a negative. Was he really concerned about this?

"You said 'mall,'" she pointed out. Then she wished she hadn't, because it got him started on a complaint about Joy's birthday, which was coming up soon, and how she liked "good smells," and how she also liked shiny things, and he had a bad feeling that she wanted him not only to get her a present, but to get something scented or sparkling. Or both.

"Maybe you could, uh, give me your opinion," he said. "As a g— As a woman."

The word _no_ came to mind, but when she looked at the hesitant quirk of his eyebrows, she suddenly wondered just how often her father had dated since her mother left. He cleared his throat and kept his eyes on the road. Somehow, she had been thinking of him as a lady killer—smiling here, winking there—roaming Forks' streets as quite the catch. But what kind of lady killer would smear himself with cinnamon?

 _A nice guy_ , she thought. _A guy who's trying._

"Okay," she said. "I guess I could smell some perfume for you. At the mall."

"So you're okay with this?"

 _Wait, does he mean this whole thing?_

He was smiling hopefully. She stared at his profile as the green trees flashed past the windows, and she realized that she had just bought a conversational equivalent of a ticket for the carnival boat ride also known as Joy Ateara's charms. It was a Swan-shaped boat. It was headed for the Tunnel of Love. On the other side of the Tunnel, Bella imagined she heard a roaring sound, and as she drifted farther and deeper, the roaring grew louder till she was out again in the fresh air, free of the Tunnel but heading straight for Niagara Falls. And where were Charlie and Joy? They were waving from the shore. She cast her wits for the mental equivalent of a life preserver. Like maybe some ground rules.

"No kissing," she blurted. "This is not happening. No making out in front of me or acting disgusting in public."

"Disgusting," he said flatly.

"PDA."

"Hmm." Charlie smirked. "That might be hard. She's kind of an animal."

"Oh, God, that's exactly— Maybe this is a horrible idea, have you ever thought of that?"

"Many times."

"And?"

"There are not a lot of fish in the sea around here."

"So you'd rather catch something than nothing."

"No. I mean, there's not a lot of chances to— She's a really nice woman, Bella."

She folded her arms.

"She's a really nice woman with a big heart."

"Big chest."

"Watch yourself. Big heart. Lots of love to give. Maybe I want some, is that so bad?"

Bella felt more disgusted, replaying the words _maybe I want some._

"And maybe I want a family. A bigger family, a bunch of people all together who—"

"You have a family," said Bella. Her voice sounded suddenly small.

"Honey, I love you so much. But people have more than one kind of love to give. There's the kind you give your kids, and there's the kind you—"

"Please stop."

Charlie frowned at the road.

"You love her?" said Bella. She said it in the tone lawyers use to say, Did you commit this murder?

He frowned more. "She's a good friend," he said carefully. "We have good memories together. We married other people, lived our own lives, but we understand some things about each other, things like— Things that are none of your business."

"Now it's none of my business?"

"She's a good woman, and you will be respectful." He slowed his speed as they crossed the village limits and rolled past the general store. The yellow glow of its lights spilled into the parking lot where a few people lingered by their cars, holding paper bags. "She's not a manipulator. She's not a taker. Not addicted to anything. You know how hard it is to find a date like that?"

"No," she mumbled.

"She makes me laugh. Laugh. That is really important. Did Edward make you laugh?"

"No."

"I am not going to point out that you are a very bad judge of char—

"Kind of pointing it out, there."

"Not pointing that out. You will be respectful. You are not twelve. She is not the devil. You will smile and say please and thank you and—"

"I have manners. I'm not twelve."

"I'm not so sure sometimes." He paused in the road at the intersection of the side street that led to the Atearas' house, his hands feeling around the steering column. "Where's the turn signal?"

Bella reached for the lever, flicked it up forcefully, and it snapped in half. "Broken," she grumbled.

Charlie rolled his window down and stuck his arm out to signal the left turn.

"There's no one around, you know."

The engine roared as he directed the truck up the hill.

Bella squeezed her eyes shut and struggled for some way to explain herself. "I just think this is a bad idea," she said. That was the best she could do. Then she stared out the window so Charlie wouldn't see how red her face was getting.

"Vampire," said Charlie. He parked in the Atearas' driveway and held his two hands stiffly in front of his chest, as if he were carrying a little box. "Vampire," he said again, setting his imaginary box on the seat between them. "Bad idea." He pointed at the torn brown vinyl as if there were a real object there for her to see and judge. "Any way you look at it." Then he pointed to the window where Joy was standing, holding a wooden spoon with a big cloud of steam behind her. "Friend. Good idea."

"Fine," she snapped. She didn't know anymore how this conversation got started, and why she was losing so bad. Hadn't they been making progress? Hadn't she offered to practically pick out a gift for Joy? What happened?

 _So you're okay with this?_

No. No, she supposed she still wasn't. He knew it quite plainly now, and he had made her feel like a brat. She got out of the truck and slammed its door.

Charlie followed more slowly.

* * *

Quil was on the couch when they came in, wearing nothing but a white T-shirt and a pair of thin, cotton, orange plaid boxers, rapidly flipping through TV channels and complaining that there was never anything good on.

"Quilly, get dressed," said Joy.

He looked up and his face went bright pink when he saw Bella. "Mom!"

"I told you and told you Charlie was coming."

"You didn't say Bella!"

"Told you and told you."

"Dammit." He growled at Bella, "Don't look."

"Don't worry," she replied sourly. "You have nothing I'd want to see."

His mother burst out laughing, and Quil stomped down the hall to his room, holding two throw pillows over his shorts, front and back.

"Don't piss him off," said Mr. Ateara. He was sitting in an armchair with his cane leaned against the wall beside it. He wore his brown leather jacket with his Korean War veteran's patches on the sleeves and a wool-lined cap. The temperature in the house, Bella noticed, was rather chilly. There was a window cracked open. Mr. Ateara looked at Bella and said, "You destroyed my lettuce crop."

"Sorry," she mumbled.

Joy hugged Charlie and said, "Ooh! You smell good!" and then, while Bella cringed, Joy hugged her, too, and said, "Ooh! You smell— different." She stepped back, pressed her lips together, and patted Bella's shoulder with a stiff arm.

"It's skunk," snarled Quil from down the hall. "You smell like you rolled in a dead one. Or several. God, so nasty, big and little ones, smells like— like immature skunk scent mixed with gnarly old—"

"Hey!" said Bella, and Joy said, "Quil! Rude!"

"And something else smells like a shit ton of cinnamon," finished Quil.

Mr. Ateara looked sharply at his grandson, stalking back down the hall now, fully dressed.

The five of them sat awkwardly around the dinner table. Joy had made salad and cheese raviolis with marinara sauce. Really made them, Bella noticed, seeing the evidence on the counter: a package of ricotta cheese, tomatoes, fresh springs of oregano, and scraps of homemade pasta. It was impressive. She caught herself wondering if Joy could teach her to make pasta one day, but she pushed that thought away with a frown. _I smell "different"? Is that her best attempt at tact?_ Quil was frowning, too, perspiring in jeans and a more presentable T-shirt, picking at his food in a way that made his mother say, "Come on, Quilly, you've got to eat something if you want to get better."

"He's not sick," said Old Quil. "He needs fresh air."

"He's sick," said Joy. "He's running a hundred and two."

"I'm not sick," said Quil. "Except for you. I'm sick of you."

"Quil!" said Joy sharply. She pointed down the hall, and Quil tossed his fork on the table and left.

"Do not piss him off," said Old Quil. He tossed his fork down, too, and followed his grandson. Bella could hear him opening the door to Quil's room. "Come on, boy. Let's go for a walk."

"Take a jacket," hollered Joy.

"I don't want a jacket! I do NOT need a jacket. I need you to leave me ALONE."

Bella heard them leave by a backdoor. Through the kitchen window, she saw Quil stalk down the driveway and turn toward the beach, his grandfather following, zipping up his coat. She wondered why he was acting so weird and wished she had been able to talk to him.

After dinner Joy and Charlie sat on the couch, sharing an afghan, sipping at glasses of red wine and watching _Sleepless in Seattle._ Joy put her head on Charlie's shoulder. It made Bella feel a creepy burble of _something_ in the pit of her stomach that made her want to punch things or run out of the room and burst into tears. She tried to steel her gaze on the television and stop curling her upper lip. Meg Ryan's character's weepy faith depressed her, and the character's journalistic sleuthing disgusted her because it seemed like a 90's version of stalking that reminded her of... someone else. _Bad judge of character_ , Charlie had said. And, _Maybe I want a bigger family._

 _"QUIL?"_ she wanted to shout at him now. _"YOU'RE READY TO SIGN UP FOR QUIL?"_

Also he had said, _There's more than one kind of love._ She knew that was true, which made the rest of it sting by association: maybe that other stuff was true, too. Bigger family? He wanted that? Since when? What did Charlie ever do with his spare time but read and fish? She wondered if she joined him in a boat now and then if it would satisfy his need for more company. She also wondered if this was part of the whole "bad idea" feeling she had. When Charlie was done with his so-called "bigger family" crush, he could be stuck with some legally binding relationships. He was infatuated. He was not himself and not capable of making decisions that fit with his long term personality. And what about _her_? Wasn't she enough? She sank into her chair, forcefully willing herself not to tear up.

When Old Quil returned alone, Bella decided to leave.

* * *

The boy sat on the edge of a cliff, overlooking the sea. Wind blew his hair away from his face and shivered its way into his T-shirt and shorts, but he didn't mind. Resting on his sitz bones, he drew his knees up to his chest and wrapped his arms around them. On the horizon, straight ahead, the sun was going down. It sank into the water like a fire sinking into snow, and the sky was streaked with yellow, pink, peach, and above that, layers of blue and purple. Behind him, darkness had already fallen on the forest.

A second boy emerged from the trees. His bare feet made no sound on the soft, mossy earth and dried needles from the wizened cedars that lined the cliff. He smelled the salt wind, the red heart of a cedar blown over in a storm, the musk of a deer waking from its sleep, ready to browse in secret timidity, and the body of the boy in front of him: mud, warm breath, and more salt.

This had happened before.

There were four of them on watch for this, but only three gave a shit.

The boy at the edge of the forest knew better than to speak. He had always been good at reading people. In the silence of the other, he read guilt and despair. An inward-turning disgust. Shame, so powerful it almost had its own scent. Powerful enough to erase other emotions, sometimes even love, and this was one of those times. The despair crept into the watcher until his shoulders sagged with defeat.

It had been two weeks. During that time, he'd learned to control the magic of rage and fear. It was tempered, as his father had hoped, by love and resilience. They were all surprised, after the blood and hair and gasping fever of the first few days, by how quickly he'd bounced back. Only three nights in the woods. Only running as far as Tacoma, panic surging through his limbs from his huge and wild heart. And after a few more days, he was mostly in control, mostly doing the homework dropped off at his house, very likely ready to return to school on Monday three inches taller and twenty pounds heavier, with the bones of his face more prominent, more like a man's—more like his father's—and with his eyes only slightly less warm, less open-hearted. It was an effort not to retreat, every day, but he was hanging on.

The boy on the cliff was not. He'd been placed on administrative leave, in a sense. Mostly useless. And the vacuum he'd been asked to fill with the blood of his brother had only opened wider.

The water was cold. As he rose from his plummeting dive, it shocked him into vigorous motion. Arm over arm. His elbow rose first from the waves, followed by his forearm and the flat blade of his hand swinging in a clean, crisp stroke over his head and gliding into the water before him. He pulled down and back with the high elbow yet minimal shoulder rotation of a champion swimmer. There wasn't much he couldn't do, athletically speaking, without precision and efficiency. He kicked from the hip, but his knees were loose enough to let his feet move softly, like flippers, and a fine thrash of bubbles trailed after his toes. Powerful deltoids flexed and contracted. It would have been beautiful if he weren't swimming toward the setting sun.

He was nearly three miles out when he began to slip beneath the waves. Though he was exhausted, his body made him rise again, hungry for air, and his heart let him fall. In the night, he was invisible on the water. The sky was only another black sea, stars shuttered behind clouds.

The other boy called his name. Again and again. Panic was there, and mouthfuls of water. He choked and sank, his legs spasming.

He'd never swum out this far before. He wasn't exactly sure of the way back. His nose and eyes stung with salt. His legs were useless, painfully cramping, but he managed to surface again with a tremendous downstroke of his arms. "Emb!" he called. "Emb, please!"

Silence.

He tried to get his jeans off. He realized he should have done that immediately; they were weighing him down and constricting his movements, but he'd chosen close pursuit instead of a delay by wrestling with his clothes. Now he knew he'd been wrong. The stiff denim bunched at his thighs, limiting his motion even further. He let himself fall, curling over his legs underwater, trying to tear the fabric. It was a gamble; he couldn't tell how many feet he went down as he twisted and pulled. A tremendous bubble escaped his mouth, and he reached for his ankles, trying to pull off the jeans that way.

His inhalation was involuntary. It burned his lungs. _Mom,_ he thought. _Mom. Mommy_.

The hearts of human beings pound. Like our lungs, they maintain their function whether we think of it or not. Whether we choose or not. His heart pounded now as he pulled in another breath of water. His head buzzed, a dull feeling spreading behind his eyes. He thought of how she used to sing to him. He would feel her hand on his back, rubbing slow circles as he lay in his bed, stiff with nightmare. She always knew. Even before he called her, she'd come and sit at the foot of his bed. She'd shake him awake and soothe him back to sleep, her palm and soft fingers going round and round between his small, thin shoulder blades. She'd sing. He wished for her voice, one last time.

Fortunately for Jacob, other motions of the body are also, sometimes, involuntary.

His muzzle broke the surface as he coughed, expelling water from his lungs. He drew in a tremendous breath as his clothes fell away from his churning legs. Then, with one more breath, he dove again into the black water.

Embry's body was a long way down. It was impossible to smell him in the water, so Jacob swam blindly, hoping. When his nose bumped something rubbery, he took it in his mouth as gently as he could. His brother's arms drifted like kelp.

At the surface, Jacob shook his prize. It was unresponsive. In another gamble, he tried to calm himself so he could regain his original form. His human limbs barely had the strength to hold his brother's head above the waves. He pounded his fist on his back. When that didn't work, he lifted him onto his shoulder, pressing against Embry's stomach, trying to make him expel the water, and trying to keep his face up so he wouldn't re-inhale it. At last, he felt his brother cough.

On the beach, the red wolf set the tall, limp boy on the sand before he collapsed. He couldn't even shake the water from his fur.

The clouds had cleared, and the moon was high in the sky when Jacob awoke to the sensation of his wolf form melting away. The change back was disconcerting sometimes. He felt he was losing himself. And when he was human and thought about the wolf, he also felt that he was losing himself. Now he closed his eyes again, shivering, as he felt the magic fading. The definitions of his body changed. His awareness of his size and shape changed. His consciousness had filled a much larger being, and now the feeling of swishing a tail was a memory that didn't feel quite real. The ghost of the wolf's head, however, seemed to hover around his own in an awareness of his capabilities in that form. He thought of how far his eyes could see, how well his ears could hear. His other ears. His human ears were remarkably sharper, but with his wolf ears—oh!—he could hover in the trees beyond the playground and hear the scratch of his teacher's pen in the classroom; he could hear the gurgle of the gas pump at the general store four blocks away, if he really thought about it; he could hear the exhalation of elk on a cold, still morning and know how far up the river valley they were. And with his human ears, he could hear the whisper of Sam outside his window at night, calling him to patrol.

Sam was a problem, but nothing like the problem retching water beside him.

Embry lifted himself onto his elbows and coughed up more of what he'd swallowed. Get up, said Jacob, standing. When Embry gained his feet, Jacob hit him across the jaw. He felt the teeth in his brother's mouth resist his fist; he watched blood spatter onto the sand. He hit him again, and when Embry fell, he climbed onto his chest and hit him in the eye, in the temple. He hit him in the ribs until he felt six of them break.

He hit him until he was exhausted again, until Embry coughed up blood instead of water.

* * *

Wind bit at Bella's cheeks in the dark street. There were no streetlights in La Push, but the clouds and mist multiplied the moonlight, casting a gray glow over the town. She walked with her hands stuffed into her pockets, her shoulders hunched.

Jacob's house was completely dark as she approached, looking except for the clean lines of its roof and walls like a lonely sea stack in a dark field. She didn't bother knocking because it was obvious that no one was home. Instead, she rattled the doorknob—locked this time—and stood on her tiptoes to peer in the dining room window. Things were messy again.

In the backyard, she stepped carefully between Sarah Black's still-living perennials, between her tulips and hydrangeas, crocuses and daffodils that she had planted below her son's window. It was open about an inch. There was a ten gallon plastic bucket from a hardware store in the yard; by turning it upside down and standing on it, and by shoving hard, she managed to slide the window completely open.

Climbing inside was difficult. She braced her hands on the sill, locking her elbows, and balanced on her stomach like a seesaw. She just didn't have the physical strength needed to get a knee up, so she clenched her abdominal muscles and rocked forward, allowing her torso to tip into Jake's room and slide down the wall. She picked herself up from the floor and flicked on a light.

His room was less messy than it had been on Thursday. Fewer clothes on the floor. Fewer blankets stripped from the bed. In fact, only his Pendleton had been removed, folded neatly, and placed on a shelf in his closet. The rest of the covers were shoved half on the floor, but the fitted sheet was still on the mattress and his pillowcase looked clean. Bella looked around for something to write with. She found a spiral notebook and a pencil under his bed, but not before she found a large yellow envelope from Jake's birthday party, his gift from Joy Ateara, which contained (she couldn't help peeking) sex ed pamphlets and condoms (which made her wish she hadn't peeked). She wiped her clammy palms on her jeans, turned Jake's light off so as not to attract attention to the house, and tried to write by moonlight on the windowsill. The act seemed both romantic and miserable.

 _Dear Jake. Don't worry. I know something is wrong. I am going to find you. Whatever you need, I'll help. Love, Bella._

If she'd been in less of a hurry, if she had paused, she might not have written that word. But there it was. She stared at the loops of her handwriting—the swirl of the capital L, the point of her v—and her fingers still resting on the page. The word was faint in the moonlight, but it was plainly legible, and she had put it there.

She froze. Then her eyebrows sank together in a frown. She hadn't felt any hesitation. As she acknowledged this, she became aware that she also hadn't felt any pain, or fear, or nausea, or ache as if her insides were cracking open. She hadn't felt like she was drowning or freezing. Hadn't felt an urge to run or hide. Had felt no tears. No self-consciousness. No feelings of uncertainty, inadequacy. Not even an urge to crumple up the paper and write a different note. She frowned and frowned. And then she did burst into tears, biting her lip to keep from sobbing aloud.

All this time.

All this time she had been thinking that love had to hurt to be real. Like if it wasn't painful, then it wasn't powerful.

It was a good thing she was kneeling because she wouldn't have been able to stand.

 _I love him, I love him, I love him, I love him!_

Folding the note in half, she crawled back to his bed and put it in his pillowcase. Billy wouldn't notice it if he looked in the room, but Jake would feel it when he lay his cheek there. Then she knew she ought to leave, but she just sat on the floor by his bed, weeping and smearing the back of her hand across her nose in joyful confusion. _Why am I crying? I love him? I do?_

Well, of course she did! It had been happening since she was four years old. She saw him on the beach, barely two, struggling after her with a pail of sand and a feather boa of kelp around his neck. She saw him zipping down the street on roller skates, smiling at her and spinning while she clung to a parked car's side view mirror, her own skates uncontrollable. She saw him eating a coffee cake she'd made with orange juice instead of eggs when she was twelve. "This blows chunks," Rachel had said, but Jake just shrugged, smiled again. When was he _not_ smiling at her? Years of memories. Almost all her life. And she saw him in his garage, rebuilding a pair of motorcycles that were really like the badly damaged pair of her heart and mind. He had rebuilt them, then handed her the keys and made it clear that he wasn't in a hurry to go anywhere, not if she didn't want to. She saw him on her porch, two weeks ago, felt his warm breath and the tear on his cheek, felt his laughter under her palm on his chest, heard the chirrup of the crickets and the creak of the swing. His lips were so soft.

 _Oh, I love him!_

She slipped off her shoes and crawled into his bed, where she lay for nearly an hour, shedding tears of joy, tears of trembling happiness, tears of laughter over how _stupid_ she had been, and still more tears for what had happened with Edward. Not tears _for_ Edward, but a few tears for herself, for the girl she had been and the way her heart had been treated. Slowly, the moon crossed the sky in front of his window as she nuzzled her face into his pillow. She smelled his sweat and pine needles.

 _Jacob, I love you! I miss you! I'll find you!_

She spoke these vows into his pillow, and then she rolled onto her back and wrapped her arms around herself, squeezing hard. She had never felt so filled with joyous purpose. Never had anyone who needed her like this! She would rescue him! But first, she would grab his wool blanket out of the closet because the night was getting colder. She unfolded it and crawled back into his bed, thinking that she just wanted to snuggle in this intimate place of his, smelling a hint of him, sending her strength to him in whatever kind of prayer her agnostic heart could manage: _Hello, universe? Look after Jake?_ Also, as she sighed, as she warmed up, and as her clenched muscles began to relax, she was thinking, _This is a bad idea. What if I fall asleep? I should go back to Quil's house._ But she flat out didn't want to. _And you can't make me,_ she thought to no one in particular as her head threatened to fill with a list of her recent worries and fuck-ups.

Vera had been glad to see her, she supposed, but what if she knew the truth?

Then there was Claire's pet.

Ellen Uley's disdain.

Allison Uley's anger.

Quil's hostility.

Charlie's criticism.

Charlie's shitty, shitty relationship decisions.

Even Mr. Ateara's lettuce and her inability to avoid shaming herself in Spanish class.

She pictured Charlie and Joy sharing a movie, a glass of wine and—she shuddered—a blanket. _What about me? Aren't I family enough? We're good, just us two, aren't we?_

These were thoughts she preferred to force from her mind. Instead, she filled her senses with the scent of the boy she loved— _loved!_ —and felt the cool night air on her cheek and the warm, scratchy wool blanket on her arms and neck. She heard a few cars passing on the road. She saw her own hand curled on the pillow in the moonlight and wished she was holding Jacob's. And faintly, she smelled Sarah's blue hyacinths.

It felt safe in Jacob's bed. She said another awkward prayer for Riley and his safety. She didn't believe in God, not really, but she thought it might help. Then she closed her eyes and inhaled in deep meditation: _Jacob._ Pine and sweat. _Jacob._ Cool cotton. _Jacob._ The rough wool. The moonlight. Her hand in his. The crackle of paper in his pillow. _Jacob._ Pine. Sweat. The scent of his body, the living sense of him as a human being that she loved.

Loved!

* * *

When Jacob woke again, the moon was large and low in the sky, and he found that his brother had crawled as far as the edge of the forest. He was crumpled on the moss, black and blue. Jacob curled around him, putting an arm around his waist and pulling him against his chest. I love you, he mumbled into his stiff, salty hair. Don't ask me to forgive you because there's nothing to forgive. It was going to happen anyway.

Embry curled tighter onto himself, shivering.

Jacob continued in the sort of half-spoken, half-thought communication that was so far unique to the brothers: You want to be sorry for what you did? Or feel sorry for me? For yourself? You want me to feel sorry? Fine. I'm sorry I broke your face.

It'll heal.

So will I.

Embry closed his eyes.

This is the last time, said Jacob. You do this because you want me to bring you back. But I swear to God, if you apologize one more time, I'll let you drown.

Embry nodded, though both of them knew that wasn't true.

You want me to hate you? More than you hate yourself? Think what this would do to your mom, Emb.

Tears rolled down Embry's face and into the dirt and moss.

Shit, said Jacob, crying now, too. I'm sorry I hit you. Maybe I can't go back to school yet. I'm so fucked up.

Yes, said Embry. He made an exhausted attempt at sarcasm. Give in to the despair. Feels so good.

I almost couldn't find you, sobbed Jacob. I almost couldn't find you.

Embry clutched his brother's hand against his heart.

And I miss Bella, sobbed Jacob.

Go to her.

I can't.

You could. If you tried harder.

Just the idea made him feel a tightness in his chest, like a fist clenching his heart. He cried harder. She's scared of me.

Because you ambushed her as an eight-foot dumbass animal.

I thought it would help.

How is that possibly going to help?

Jacob cried with his forehead pressed to his brother's back.

Stop it, said Embry. The others will see this later and kick your ass. Again.

Jacob thought that was unlikely. If anything, Embry would get clobbered for dragging another wolf out to sea. Again. He felt his brother stiffen as the thought passed through his mind. Emotions, too, were bleeding between the brothers in human form. I won't let— began Jacob, just as Embry said, I can take care of myself. Then the dread of phasing with the others, having them all see this, settled over them both like a dreary fog.

The pack mind twisted its individuals together like ribbons around a maypole. It wasn't like blending paint. The colors were all still ribbons, easily unwound if necessary, or unwound just for the hell of it. They could braid themselves, twist around a pole (or a purpose) or just run through the trees as separate streamers of color. Jake had thought of this ribbon metaphor one day last week, and Paul said, You get to be pink then, and Embry said, That's sexist. Are you putting him down because pink is a girl color? Paul said, Yes, duh, pink is a girl color. Okay, said Embry, then by extension you're suggesting not that pink is wimpy, but that _girls_ , symbolized by this color, are wimpy. Paul said, Yeah, cuz they're girls. No, said Embry, it's like you're saying they don't deserve respect. Paul said, What? And Jared said, Kim looks good in pink and you better respect her. Then he thought of parts of Kim's body that were pink, and the other boys cringed and said, Come on, man, not again, and Jared tried hard to think of something else. You're putting down girls, said Embry, and Paul said, You're a girl, and Jacob said, What are you, in second grade or something? 'You're a girl' and 'I know you are but what am I?' and Embry said, See, right there, that proves you are a sexist pig. Sam, who rarely spoke unless necessary, said, Yeah, you are kind of a sexist pig, Paul, and Paul said, All I said was that Jake had to be pink. Fucking ribbon twirler. Dance, Jakey. Go fuck your metaphor.

Sam sent out waves of displeasure that needed no words. His color was black. Jared was green, Embry was pale blue, Jake was stuck with pink, though he tried really hard to create a psychic impression of something yellow or orange, and when he failed, he tried to pin Paul with lavender. Because it's pastel? Embry had said. Because girls like it? Are you choosing that to be insulting? Because if you are— Four other voices told him to shut up, and Embry ran silently over the strand as they patrolled the beach north of La Push at night. The sand felt good on their toes. Embry tried to concentrate on that, but really all he could think was that he wanted to be back in school. He missed his English class. And he'd found a Sociology 101 college textbook at a yard sale recently, but had only had time to read enough to identify and label some of the various ways Paul was a sexist pig and/or all-around asshole. Paul said Embry could go fuck his textbook, too. Paul tried to become red, but he ended up being purple as a compromise. P is for Purple and for Paul, said Jacob, and it stuck. Also for Prick, said Jacob. And for Pig, said Embry.

Whee! said Jared, imagining himself as a kite with black, green, light blue, pink, and purple ribbons streaming from it. And Paul _didn't_ give _him_ any shit about this image because he was visualizing snapping the tendons in the brothers' hind legs. Think of something productive, Paul, said Sam. P is for Productive, said Jacob, and Paul whirled on him with fang and claw.

"I hate this," said Embry, plainly, aloud, lying on the moss at the edge of the woods with his brother.

"I miss Bella," Jake said again, tonelessly. "I miss her so much."

"You gotta ignore Paul, okay?"

Yeah, right, thought Jacob. It seemed he needed to punch or bite Paul every day over some needling comment or other.

The moon was sinking into the trees now and birds were beginning to sing. Jacob sat up and pressed the heel of his hand against his forehead, his elbow on his knee. Embry sat up, too, and said, Shit, my nose. I think you broke my nose.

Jacob pressed it into place with his fingers as his brother swore at him. Are we even? said Jacob. Please say yes; I'm so tired of this.

* * *

 **Thank you for reading. Please review.**

1\. What do you think about Bella and Charlie's conversation in her truck?

2\. What do you think about Embry's swimming out to sea?

3\. How about Bella's note to Jacob and her reaction to what she wrote? (Yay?)

4\. What about Jacob's reaction to Embry's behavior? AmandaForks wrote what came naturally, yet AmandaForks is not sure where this might lead the story. Is this violence understandable? Does this mean Jacob is abusive, as in, hurt someone and then apologize and say you love that person? That's not right. Does Jake's fear of losing E. justify what he did? Why or why not? I'm interested in your views since I'm still developing Jake's post-phase character. What will keep him MY Jacob and not canon or fanon, necessarily? How will he be true to what I wrote before? What's in his heart now? (Apparently, it's THIS because it flowed right out.) And now I've freaked myself out a little. Kindly offer your opinion? Kindly?

5\. Pack mind. I'm maybe going to try a stream-of-consciousness style of writing with fewer formalities to designate or differentiate speech and thought. Smooth? Confusing? Confusing but interesting? Hmm...

6\. Pack mind. This is the first time I've written scenes without Bella! Every other moment of the story has been from a limited omniscient perspective, and given that we're dealing with Bella, it has been truly limited. It's kind of like the story's personality, for better or worse. So what does the glimpse into the pack feel like for you? Too jarringly different? Out of place? Interesting? Shall I write more like this? I'm thinking yes... Not sure.

YOU DON'T HAVE TO RESPOND TO ALL THAT! But if a topic or two intrigues you, then please let me know what you think.

 **THANK YOU again. Previews to reviewers!**


	8. Chapter 8 Quil Takes the Lead

**Chapter Eight**

 **"Quil Takes the Lead"**

Bella was awakened by a voice that hissed, "He is really going to appreciate you stinking up his bed, skunk breath."

Quil was leaning through Jacob's open bedroom window. It was eleven o'clock, Bella was snuggled into Jacob's bed, and the moon was high in the sky. She sat up and tried to smooth her hair into place.

"Were you waiting for him?"

"No," she said. "Not really."

"Well, Charlie sent me to look for you. So I came here."

Bella put her shoes on, returned Jake's blanket to its shelf, and straightened the sheets on his bed. Then Quil gave her a hand so she could climb out the window. She returned the bucket she had used as a step to roughly the spot in the yard where she'd found it and said that it wasn't her fault that she smelled like a skunk; it was Sam's fault; and she described the debacle on Thursday afternoon.

"Sam," said Quil sourly. "He probably knows where Jake is. It's like he's been kidnapped. Or worse."

"Worse?"

The night had grown colder since she had arrived at Jake's house. She zipped up the raincoat she had borrowed from Leah, but it was unlined and almost good for nothing. Shoving her hands into her pockets, she followed Quil around the side of the house and over the driveway. The moon was bright enough to cast shadows behind them on the pale stones, and in the silence of the deep night, the crunching under their shoes seemed startlingly loud. Quil stopped at a corner of the garage and stood looking at his boots, shuffling his feet in the gravel.

"Can you keep a secret?"

Bella almost laughed.

"This afternoon I was poking around here, and I found something." He led her around the garage to the side that faced the backyard and the woods. There was a small door there she hadn't noticed before, and as they approached it, Quil held his arm out to prevent her from getting too close. "Look," he said. As her eyes roved over the ground and she struggled to focus in the moonlight, she beheld dozens of tiny ridges in the mud. Quil knelt and traced a few with his finger, making curved shapes, large and small ones. When Bella knelt, too, she saw that they were the same kind of paw prints she had seen on the trail behind Sam's house.

"Oh, my God."

Quil spread his hand over one. His hand was larger than she'd realized, and she was struck again with the sense that he'd been having some kind of growth spurt these past few weeks. Now his hand was as large as these prints.

"There's lots," he said. "They go around this side of the building, across the yard, and into the woods. And look at this." As he spoke, he stepped wide over the prints and onto a square of concrete below the door. Bella followed with an awkward leap and looked where Quil pointed. "It's hair," he said, indicating a tuft of something caught on a door hinge at about eye level. "Or fur."

Bella couldn't see it, but she believed him.

"And there's more," grimaced Quil. He shoved the door hard with his shoulder and flicked on a light inside the garage. There on the concrete floor was a pile of clothes in a mess of dried mud: dirty jeans, a couple of T-shirts, a pair of tennis shoes, a pair of socks, and two pairs of cotton undershorts.

Bella began to cry. "Oh, God, it's eaten him." She turned her face into Quil's chest. He flipped the light off, closed the door, and sat on the floor with her.

"Shh!" he said. "There's no blood."

"It's dragged him off!"

"What dragged him off?"

There had been a few times in Bella's life where she felt she had come to a moral crossroads. It began with not telling her middle school counselor in Arizona that her grades were slipping because she was concerned about Renee's cannabis consumption. What was occasionally putting your mother to bed compared to temporary custody and time in foster care? What if Charlie wouldn't come for her? It was best not to mention some things. And later, keeping Edward's secret was easy because she'd already had so much practice. There was a certain tragic thrill to it. She could carry on, silent and strong, because she had to. She was good at it and had come to regard it as both necessary for survival and an admirable silver thread in the cloth of one's moral character. Keeping the entire Cullen coven's secret, and that business in Arizona secret, and Billy's interference secret, and Vera's secret, and even her own secrets from Vera felt sometimes like stars in her crown. Prickly stars that made her bleed now and then, but stars nevertheless.

She recalled watching Humphrey Bogart movies with her mother during the summers, movies where cops said things in nasal, drawling voices, things like, "What do we have here? Oh, a wise guy, eh?" and the bad guys said things like, "You didn't see nuthin'," and "You'll keep yer trap shut—unless yeh wanna be sleepin' wid the fishes." That's where "stool pigeons" ended up: on the bottom of the Hudson. When she was younger she used to imagine herself in the school counselor's office with bright lights directed at her face. She wouldn't crack. That was a sign of weakness. But now...

"Can _you_ keep a secret?" she whispered.

Like campfire stories, tales of eight foot monsters sound more scary in the dark. But they didn't feel they could risk turning the light on. Instead, Quil found a lightbulb in a wire cage on a long, orange cord that Jake used to hang on the Rabbit's hood when he worked on the engine. Sitting cross-legged on the floor, Bella held it upright like a microphone. The effect was that she looked like a talk show host at the world's creepiest story circle. Her face was glowing orange, the thin skin of her nostrils translucently pink, and her cheekbones cast upward shadows sharp as knives. Quil scooted discreetly backward.

First she asked him if he believed in magic, and when he said no, she asked him if he believed that the animal that made those footprints was real. No, he said. Maybe not. Maybe it was a trick. Or a joke. Jake liked jokes. Maybe he had planned this.

If that's true, said Bella, then where's the ketchup?

The ketchup, he said, like the punchline, was probably in the woods. This was not funny. In fact, it pissed him off, and he was going to punch Jake in the face for scaring everybody so bad. "He's gotta be in a tent somewhere with a bunch of sandwiches, just laughing at us."

"No. I saw it."

Morally, telling Quil about the wolf monster did not make her a stool pigeon because she owed no loyalty to Sam. But it took a long time because Quil kept saying, "Noooooo..." really slowly.

"I saw it on Thursday. There's a— Magic. Okay, do you believe in magic?"

"Nooooo..." he said, frowning, looking at the pile of Jake's clothes.

"Okay. Now don't freak out. There's a very big animal in the woods."

"An elk."

"No."

"A bear. Oh. Do you think it's the bear that attacked Emily? You think it got Jake? Maybe he's in a ditch somewhere, wounded. We'll find him."

"I don't think so." She pushed Jake's muddy clothes aside and drew a stick-figure animal with her finger on the dusty floor. She gave it an oval body, four stick legs, a long shaggy tail, and a head with pointy ears and big fangs.

"A cat?" said Quil.

"A wolf."

There was a long pause. Then, "Nooooo..."

"Yes. Sam is in control of it. It's a plot, or a cult, or something. A secret monster."

"Noooooo..." said Quil, his heavy black eyebrows sinking as he frowned. But he looked scared, which Bella took as a sign that he wasn't completely disbelieving her, so she pushed on.

"I saw it on Thursday, and it was huge. Like, almost as tall as me, at the shoulder. And it was creeping closer and closer, with huge teeth and reddish brown fur, and then Sam appeared and he yelled at it until it went away. It's his pet. Or animal slave. Or monster henchman. He controls it. He must have partly tamed it."

"You are so full of shit," said Quil. He took the flashlight and held it under his own chin. It made him look extra angry. "First of all, you're horrible. How long have you been in on this joke? Second, Sam can't train shit. He had a dog all through high school, and it would poop on his kitchen floor and eat his grandma's books. Wouldn't come when he called. Wouldn't even come if he waved a hot dog at it. All it ate was Gravy Train and potato chips, and he was calling it to come out of the fucking road when it got hit by a car.

Bella frowned at him.

"Once upon a time," he snarled, "there was a horrible girl called Bella who played a horrible, not-funny joke on her friends."

Bella got up and felt the door hinges until she found the tuft of fur Quil had seen. When she held it near the light, they saw that it was reddish brown.

Quil drew an animal in the dust. An oval body, four stick legs, a head with pointy ears, smaller teeth, and a long, smooth, curvy tail. He gave it two eyes, a nose with whiskers, and a smile. "Whoever rubbed a cat on the door is cruel to animals."

"A cat with paws like dinner plates?" she said, which shut him up. "Look, I'm sorry about this. Sorry to blow your mind, or your sense of what's normal. Believe me, I wish things were normal, but there is a giant wolf out there, swear to God, and I think it's got Jake."

Quil's "Nooooooooo..." was much quieter than before.

They should probably have returned to the Atearas' house by now, so quickly, she described her suspicions: Sam knew where Jake was because when she asked him, he said he was "safe." He didn't say that he didn't know. "Safe" means he knows. And obviously, the wolf monster did what Sam told it, so Sam and the monster are holding Jake hostage. Maybe Jake was resisting the brain washing that seemed to have compelled Jared, Paul, and even Embry into its service, following Sam around, maybe constantly roving the woods because they were catching rabbits and raccoons to feed it.

"Couldn't it feed itself?" said Quil.

Bella grabbed the flashlight from him because it seemed to lend her authority. This pile of clothes, she said, means that things are worse than she thought at first. Maybe since he was resistant, they were going to sacrifice him to the monster.

"What?" said Quil. "I'm going home."

Bella tried to draw an approximation of the traditional wolf figures on the Community Center and over the door of the general store. It was really hard. So many lines, shapes within shapes. "You're doing it wrong," said Quil, taking over. Quickly, he corrected her drawing. It looked remarkably good.

"Wow," said Bella. "Okay, what's that?"

"A wolf."

"And how come you drew it so well?"

"Cuz of second grade. And third grade. And fourth grade. And every fucking school art project ever, we make stuff like this. We make otters, and eagles, and fish, and we get visits from this Tlingit guy who brings brushes and ink that he makes from charcoal. But mostly wolves. Always assigned to draw those."

"Why?"

"Because they're our thing. You know. Look at the cedar canoes. And the totems. Even the tribal stationery."

"Okay, but why is it your thing?"

"Because it's the thing. Like a mascot. Because of the stories. Legends."

"Legends?"

"Didn't you ever hear this?" He sounded impatient. "Once there were some wolves, and they walked around the forest until they found this place, and one said, I will build my house of straw, and the other said, I will build my house of sticks, and the third said, I will build my house of bricks, and then the wolf came—"

"That's a pig story. Huff and puff and blow your house down."

He blinked. "Sorry!" he said. "You're fucking with my mind. Once there were some wolves, and they said, this looks like a good place, so they turned into people and those were the first Quileutes."

"Ohhhh!" said Bella. Her eyes were very big. In the flashlight's glow, she saw Quil's eyes fill with tears.

"This is impossible," he said.

Bella began to cry, too. "Maybe I'm crazy."

"Maybe not," he said, rubbing the back of his hand across his nose. "We have to think."

In the dirt, he drew a vertical line. On the left of the line, he wrote "crazy," and "joke." On the other side of the line, he wrote, "paw prints," "fur" and "witness."  
"Not 'witness,'" sniffed Bella. "Maybe you're right. Maybe this is crazy." Maybe if she squeezed her eyes shut hard enough, if she wished hard enough, she'd wake up at home and this would all be a dream. Or a nightmare.

Quil stared at the fur. "For the sake of argument, let's pretend."

"Okay."

"Pretend. If there is a wolf monster, what would we do?"

"Save Jake."

"Right. So let's save him. What's the worst that could happen?"

* * *

They took the long way back to Quil's house, whispering in the dark streets. Bella's hands were shaking. It surprised her to have another person believe her story; it made her want to back away from the belief and leave that problem to someone else. It also made her feel like the wolf-monster was real as all hell because Quil believed her. Surely one of them was crazy. "This is so stupid," she kept saying, but Quil said, "We have to save him. If we're stupid, it's only us. Right? We won't tell anybody." So she said, sure, whatever, it can't hurt. But it was hurting; her stomach was hurting so bad because her insides were twisted up with dread. Either they were being idiots and Jake was still missing, or they had guessed correctly, and Jake was in danger. Quil was right. They had to try to do something.

Quil's plan was based on legend and logic. He kept prefacing his statements with, "Let's pretend," or "Just for the sake of argument," but the heart of each sentence was a plan for action. They thought of other legends because, as Quil said, they ought to think like the monster. There was a raven legend, said Quil, where the raven brought the sun to earth in its beak. How is that related, said Bella. I don't know, said Quil. Bella said there was the legend of the Kraken, a sea monster. It wanted a beautiful maiden for a sacrifice. Dragons wanted those, too.

"If only we could find a beautiful maiden," said Quil, shoving her in the shoulder.

The point, said Bella, was that monsters wanted a sacrifice. An important sacrifice, the best thing possible. Maybe they could exchange its hostage, Jake, for a satisfactory sacrifice. What would a Quileute monster legend wolf-thing want?

"Meat?" said Bella.

"Art? Wolf art from school?" Quil thought his mom might have saved some in a drawer.

"Jewels?" said Bella. "Gold?"

"What's it gonna do with gold? Spend it?"

"Gold is valuable. What's it going to do with your second grade drawings?"

"Frame them," he deadpanned.

The village was utterly silent now, lights off in most of the houses. Only the sound of the sea, a whisper of small waves moving over the sand, came distantly from the west. The white moon shone overhead on two twitchy teenagers walking quickly, their heads down. Perhaps, they said, they should get a pillowcase and fill it with an assortment of sacrificial items, kind of like an insurance policy, so that at least one thing would appeal to the monster. And they should move quickly, before more rain came to mess up what little trail they could find leading from Jake's backyard. In fact, maybe they should go this very night, while their parents were sleeping. They could sneak out.

"I'll tell my mom that you can stay for a sleepover. Charlie can come get you in the morning. Or I'll drive you home."

Bella almost laughed. "You and me," she said flatly. "Having a slumber party."

"Well, have you got a better idea?"

She did not. And she knew it would be best to avoid needing to use a noisy vehicle to get back and forth from Forks. Best to stay in La Push.

"We have to do it tonight," he said. "Sleepover at my house. Then sneak out."

Bella tried to take a deep breath. The night air was so cold it made her eyes water, and her pulse had been skittering for several blocks as she thought of what else was in the woods: almost certainly a sick, cruel, hiker-shredding vampire. Walking out there with a bag of meat seemed like a death sentence. But since Jake was already there, she swallowed hard and said, "Okay." Then, as Quil continued to speculate about sacrifices, Bella began making plans to leave him behind, to ditch him somehow, for his own safety.

Suddenly Quil stopped walking. "Wait a minute... The legend. The wolves turned into people. So maybe the people could turn—"

"Maybe Jake could turn into wolf food," said Bella. "Concentrate."

"Right," said Quil. "I don't know what I was thinking."

* * *

Lights were dim in the Ateara house. As they approached, they saw one light wink out at the end of the house near the living room. Grandpa's going to bed, said Quil. The lights in the living room were still on, but they were suspiciously... dim. Bella and Quil exchanged an anxious look as they tiptoed up driveway and peered through the front door.

The dining table had been mostly cleared and wiped clean. Beyond that, they could see the television, faintly glowing with what looked like the end credits for the movie, but the screen wasn't changing and it seemed that the DVD player had been paused. And between the dining table and the television, they saw the back of the couch. There was a dark, rounded thing moving there, above the back of the couch, backlit by the television. It moved apart like an amoeba dividing, then it moved together again, and it seemed to be wiggling or swaying. Bella felt a floating sensation in her gut, a detached mystification: _Huh. What's that?_ Quil put his hand over his mouth and turned away. Seeing his reaction made her squint at the thing again, and she realized it was two things, two heads, above the back of the couch, moving toward one another and together, tenderly.

"Oh, God," she whispered. "No."

Quil silently slid down the door and sat on the porch, leaning against it. He pulled his knees up to his chest and stared blankly over the driveway.

She did the same. She hoped Quil would say something, but he didn't, and after a few minutes, tears filled her eyes. She wouldn't wipe them from her cheeks because she hoped that, in the dark, he couldn't tell that she was crying.

"Get up," he whispered.

"No."

"Get _up._ " He dragged her to the end of their driveway, then walked up it again, loudly scuffing his feet in the gravel, bellowing, "Hey, Bella, we're almost home now." He bumped into the garbage can for good measure and stomped his feet on the porch. "Make sure you get all the mud off," he said, scraping his tennis shoes on the edge of the wooden porch hard enough to make the whole platform vibrate. Bella smeared her hands over her face, peeked in the window, pronounced the situation under control, and opened the door. Charlie and Joy were in the kitchen all of a sudden, washing dishes.

"Well," said Joy. "We were beginning to worry about you."

"We're fine."

"It's late," said Bella. "Ch— Dad, you should go. Quil invited me to sleep over."

"He what?"

"We're just hanging out," she said. "Maybe we'll watch _Spaceballs_ or something." _Oh my God, I did NOT just suggest watching Spaceball_ s.

Charlie and Joy exchanged glances. "Actually," he said, "I was thinking that you should go on home without me. I've had a little too much to drink. I should stay here."

Bella glanced at the wine glasses on the coffee table. Both were half empty, and the wine bottle on the dinner table was just as full as it had been after they'd poured themselves one glass each. "Why don't you just let me drive you home?" she said.

"Because you're having a sleepover. You'll be here."

"But I thought you wanted me to go home."

Charlie Swan and his daughter stared at one another.

"This is not working," said Joy. "Maybe—"

"No, no, it's working," said Charlie.

Quil shoved Bella toward the hall. "Thanks, Mom. We're gonna hang out in my room." She stumbled ahead of him, and once they'd gone inside and shut the door, he said, "Shit, shit, shit, shit, shit." Bella frowned at the floor and said the worst word she could think of, and Quil threw his pillow at her, hissing, "No! No! Don't you even say that."

From the kitchen, they heard uncertain murmuring.

"Has this—" She could hardly ask the question, and she wasn't sure she wanted to hear the answer. "Has this happened before?"

"No!" he hissed. "Are you fucking kidding me?"

"Don't say that!"

"Shit."

"Fu—"

"Shut _up_!"

Bella sat on the floor, cross-legged, and pinched the bridge of her nose. She hadn't expected to face this problem so soon.

That night, _both_ of the Swans ended up staying at the Atearas' house. Joy gave her and Charlie a couple of toothbrushes from an unopened package she found in a drawer—"Thank you," mumbled Bella while Charlie glared at her—and Quil offered Charlie some of his grandpa's humongous flannel pajamas, printed with reindeer, freshly laundered and folded nicely on top of the washing machine. Charlie accepted the pajamas but lifted an eyebrow at Joy, who said, "Look, they're getting along," to which Charlie replied, "It's because they share the same goal," and Joy said, "Quilly, when you're older, you'll—" but she couldn't finish because Quil snarled something that no one understood. He went to his room and slammed the door. "Maybe I should go," said Charlie. Joy said, "Okay," and went to get her coat while Bella reminded Charlie that he'd had too much wine and shouldn't drive home.

"You are in such deep, deep trouble, young lady," he said quietly.

Joy came back with her coat, ready to leave. Charlie said that he'd changed his mind. Quil reappeared with a hot pink pillow and a fluffy pink comforter that Bella was certain did not belong to him or his grandfather. "These are for Bella," he declared. Joy said, "Wait a minute—" and Bella said, wrapping the comforter around her shoulders, "Ooh, thank you." Charlie gestured to the couch, saying, "You can have the—" and Bella finished, "Floor. That's fine. You can have the couch." She and Quil dragged the pink comforter to his room.

There was no uncertain murmuring from the kitchen that time. Joy opened Quil's bedroom door and said sternly, "Do not put that comforter on the floor," and when Bella thought maybe she would luck out and Quil would take the floor, Joy said, "Don't put it on the bed, either."

Bella blinked at Quil's bed. It was an indescribable mess of worn undershorts, black sheets with white splotches on them, and what looked like two cups of corn chip crumbs. And under the mattress— Well, she remembered that Embry had said there was some really, really weird literature there.

Charlie appeared in the doorway just as Joy took a deep breath with her hand over her ample bosom. "Okay," she said. "I get it. I do. You kids have all these _feelings_ , and it's important to talk about them. So let's talk."

Quil and Bella folded their arms.

"Things change. People change. Charlie is a good man, Quil, have you thought of that?"

"Yes," he said glumly.

"He has a lot to give, and maybe I want some—"

"Aw, no!" said Bella and Quil together.

"So _that's_ what this is about." Joy raised a well-defined, carefully plucked black eyebrow. "Fine. Sex. A normal, natural thing for caring adults to have. Nothing to be ashamed of. So let's talk about sex."

"Nope," said Charlie. "No need for that."

Joy turned to him.

"Not in front of the kids," he said, shifting on his feet. "Not now."

"Then when? Clearly it's bothering them. You might think this is none of their business—"

"None of our business," said Quil.

"—but _we_ are. As parents. We are their business." Bella's face was bright pink and Quil, his jaw clenched, stood stiffly staring at a corner of his room just to the left of his mother's head. Joy's black eyes were snapping. Her long, dark hair, which she'd piled on her head in a loosely elegant twist, had become undone. Bella figured that had happened on the couch, and it made her blush more. "Come on, Charlie," Joy said. "If we're going to be together, we have to be open. Families need to talk about this."

"No, they don't. Not this."

"We are _adults._ Teenagers sneak around."

"Not me," Bella started to say, but Charlie said, "Yes, you did." His discomfort and frustration found a target. "You have kept plenty of secrets."

"This is not about me!" said Bella. She looked at Joy to defend her before she realized it.

"No," Joy conceded, "not about her. Not about Quil, either. He doesn't have anywhere to sneak to."

"Mom!" said Quil.

"Look, Charlie, we're not teenagers anymore. We don't have to hide, or lie, or sneak out, or be embarrassed."

Charlie was silent, his face red.

" _Are_ you embarrassed about this? About me?"

"No! No, I— Well, yes, but—"

Joy's eyes became very, very large. Slowly, she closed Quil's bedroom door. The mechanism gave a soft click, and then there was a silence in the hall so awful that it seemed to seep under the door like a cloud of black smoke.

Had the roof been made of glass, and had the moonlight been brighter, a owl overhead would have seen a strange, lonely picture in the little white house that night. In a bedroom off the living room, an old man lay on his side, snoring, with his walking stick against the wall and his blankets pulled up to his ears. On the other end of the house, in a bedroom decorated with flowers, mirrors, pink candles, and rose petals, an overweight woman silently cried herself to sleep. On the couch, a tall, thin man lay on his back, staring at the ceiling. And in a smaller bedroom, two teenagers sat on the floor beside one another, leaning their backs against an unmade bed. Eventually the smaller one nodded off, and the larger pushed the sheets and dirty clothes off his bed, spread a bath towel on the bare mattress, and nudged the smaller one up there. He covered her with a fleece blanket printed to look like a shark, with white triangular trim at the top, as if the shark were eating the sleeper. Then he made a nest for himself in his dirty sheets and lay looking at a photo of a tall, heavy man with dark hair and a wide smile. Eventually he, too, fell asleep. Around four in the morning, the man on the couch tiptoed down the hall and paused with his knuckles poised against the woman's door. Then he ran his hand through his hair roughly and returned to the couch.

* * *

Sunday morning found Bella telling more lies, and she was so, so bad at it.

First she called Newton's Outfitters and spoke to Mike's mom. Claiming to be sick felt wrong and bad, but knowing that Mike would have to take her shift felt worse. She could not have pulled off the lie in person.

Next she lied to Charlie about searching for Jacob in La Push. She would meet Quil as soon as possible and try to track those paw prints. "Conducting more interviews?" Charlie said. "Uh, yes," she said. _An interview with a monster._ And Charlie didn't notice her evasiveness because he was stuck in his head. Bella knew that look. He was staring out the window while his cup of coffee cooled on the table, thinking, she supposed, about Joy.

When they had awakened this morning at the Atearas' house, Bella smiled to see that Quil had given her a blanket and the more comfortable place to sleep. She thanked him, but he wasn't interested in that. There was a photo in the pile of sheets he'd slept in, and he was anxious to prevent her seeing it as he put it in a drawer. Out in the living room, Joy was dressed in jeans and a purple sweater with her hair in a ponytail. She kissed the air near Charlie's cheek and sailed out the door, calling, "Toodle-loo! I'll be at Tiffany's, Quil," and Charlie grabbed his coat and walked out to the truck. Bella followed. Charlie drove. As they headed out of town, Bella said, "Dad?" and Charlie said, "Don't talk to me."

So now here she was, filling her backpack with wolf sacrifices while Charlie stared at the lawn. She put in her grandmother's photograph, thinking that if the wolf was magic, it might be able to see into her heart, and this was one of her most precious possessions. She also opened the freezer and put in a package of pork chops. I _'ll huff and I'll puff and I'll..._ Yes, if the Quileute wolf was like fairy tale wolves, then it liked to eat pig. She imagined setting the pork chops on the ground in front of it while Jacob, tied to a tree, looked on. Then, as she imagined the wolf sniffing her offering, she imagined that it would look at Jacob and see that there was far, far more meat on his bones than in the little pink heap on a styrofoam tray from the Thriftway. So she added a few other things from the freezer, a couple pounds of ground beef, some salmon steaks, and some chicken breasts. In the refrigerator she found several links of smoked sausage.

 _I am an idiot. I am such an idiot. I am wasting food. This is never going to work. What if we can't find it? What if we hike all day while meat rots on my back?_

The phone rang. It was Quil. All he said was, "Hurry up; he could be dying," so she zipped her backpack closed and slunk out of the house.

When she arrived in La Push, she parked in Billy's driveway and banged on his door. No one answered. Behind the garage, she found Quil kneeling, examining the paw prints, with a rifle slung over his shoulder. The sight made her stumble on the grass.

"What the heck is that? Do you know how to use that?"

"Yes." He looked affronted. "It's my dad's. I can hit a beer can at five paces."

"Five?"

"What did you bring?"

She showed him the bag of meat.

"Nice. You give it the offering, and I'll kill it."

"This is not our goal. No one said anything about killing it."

"I'll kill it if it gets too close."

"Maybe this is a bad idea."

"Everything's a bad idea. Your dad. This plan."

"He's not a bad idea. Your mom—"

"You leave her out of it. Charlie fucked up."

"Don't _say_ that. Geez."

Quil reached over his shoulder with his right hand to draw the rifle from its camouflage canvas sling, flipping it into a firing position with the butt against his shoulder, aiming into the trees.

"You're going to kill somebody. Look, I don't like this. Leave it here."

"I got the safety on."

"You can't shoot your spirit wolf magic ancestor!"

He frowned at her. "I can't let it hurt Jake. Or you. Or me. And isn't there possibly a serial killer out there? Who killed those hikers? I don't feel like dying."

"You can't shoot a person!"

Flipping the rifle again and sliding it into its sheath, he pressed his lips together and stared at the grass. "No," he said quietly, "I never could. But I could threaten him, if necessary."

Tears came to Bella's eyes. Now that they were about to do this, she had to admit that she was really, really scared. If they didn't find Jake, the vampire might find them. And if they didn't find Jake, the vampire might still... She tried to convince Quil to let her go alone, saying that the wolf hadn't eaten her on Thursday, but he was adamant. And he saw through her.

"Why not?" he demanded. "Why don't you want me to go?"

"Because there's a v—" she blurted, still teary. This was another moral crossroads, wasn't it? Would a stool pigeon tell him about vampires? She certainly owed no loyalty to the one in the woods, if she had correctly guessed its presence. But faced with Quil's determination, all she could think was how loving he was. Loving! she realized. He loved his cousin. And his heart was so pure—except for his nasty magazines, she thought—that it seemed wrong to rip the veil from his eyes. "There's a v— very good chance you could get hurt."

"Fuck that." His grin was sharp and white. "Let's go huntin', fair maiden."

* * *

She followed him through the bushes. It hadn't rained last night, so the wolf prints in the yard had been easy to spot. In the woods, however, they were elusive. Depressions in the mosses and tiny broken branches became precious evidence of the wolf's passing. They followed their best guess of a trail until they reached Old Quil's garden.

"Why am I not surprised?" said Quil. He unlocked the shed and peeked in the cooler. Bella's things were still there. She didn't feel like looking. Quil confirmed their presence, coughed, and closed the lid. "This has got to be related."

"Why?"

"Comes under the heading of 'weird shit.' Plus they were singing that question song. What the fuck are they wondering about? It's some photos, a CD, and plane tickets. Did Edward give that stuff to you?"

She nodded.

"What do they care about him?"

Bella hitched her backpack of meat higher on her shoulder. Yeah, she thought, why _were_ Edward's things so interesting to Billy and Old Quil? It dawned on her that Billy must have told Old Quil about the vampires, and maybe they were conducting some sort of research on her stuff. Was this connected to the wolf monster?

"I don't know," she said.

"You don't know?" He sounded irritated. The vague, flowery whiff from the cooler had come out of the shed in what felt like a noxious cloud. It made her feel irritated, too, and sad and sick. It was hard to concentrate on what he was saying: "The monster's paw prints lead to your stuff. Why?"

"I don't know!"

Quil turned to leave, but after about five steps, he stumbled to the edge of the garden where he dropped to his knees, leaning over the wet grasses and weeds, and vomited. "I can't breathe," he gasped. When his body stopped spasming, he rolled onto his back, tears streaming down his face.

"Ohhhh," said Bella, squatting beside him. "Are you—"

Suddenly he jumped up, growling, "Don't touch me! Get away!" He rushed at the shed, which made a dull boom as he kicked it, the wood cracking on the back wall. He slammed into it with his shoulder and bloodied his knuckles punching it.

"What are you doing?" she cried. He couldn't seem to hear her. "Stop, stop!" The rattle, clang, and clatter of tools in the shed told her that rakes and shovels were tumbling from their hooks. Quil stood on one foot and hammered the heel of his other into the wall. He was reaching for the rifle over his shoulder when Bella tackled him.

At least, that's what she tried to do.

She ended up sagging against his side with her arms around his waist, her knees surely digging green stains into her jeans in the wet grass. It had the desired effect, though. He stilled, then began to tremble. Bella stood, keeping her arms around him, and pulled him away from the shed. She pulled him down the trail that led to Sam's yard as he stumbled dazedly beside her. When he seemed calm again, she urged him to sit down on a mossy log. "No," he said dizzily. "My butt will get wet." She pushed him down anyway and sat beside him, still holding on.

"I'm scared," he said, tearing up again. His face was red and he wiped his eyes on the back of his arm. "What's happening to me? I feel so sick. I want to kill something."

"What?"

"Something. Kill it."

"You can't kill a shed."

As he put his hands over his face and his elbows on his knees and wept, Bella felt a cold dread snaking down her spine. This was how Jacob had felt in those last few days before he disappeared: emotional, unpredictable, wanting to smash things. She remembered him at the pizza parlor in Port Angeles, on their disastrous not-date, as he smeared the petals of a red carnation over the white table cloth: _If there was something to kill, I would kill it for you_. Something bad was happening. She was losing her friends. She put her hand on Quil's forehead, and he was burning up, just like Jacob on the movie night.

She tried to will herself not to cry. Quil was beginning to blubber openly, his breathing unsteady, and she felt that one of them had to keep calm.

"Shh," she said. "You're too worried about Jacob. That's all."

"My stomach hurts."

"Maybe you should go home and rest." _Yes. This is the perfect opportunity to lose him, to keep him safe_.

"I can't rest. I haven't slept more than an hour at a time in three days."

"What? Why?"

"I don't know! And I can't tell anyone; my mom will think it's appendicitis."

"Or an unplanned pregnancy," she joked.

He gave a hiccup of a laugh.

"Look, you are obviously not feeling well. You tried to shoot the shed. You should go home."

He shook his head.

"At least ditch the gun. It's making me nervous."

He just shook his head again, and she leaned on his shoulder and closed her eyes. Maybe if she told him the truth, he'd go home. If she told him about the vampire. The dampness from the mossy log was seeping through her jeans, chilling her, and she thought there was a good chance that somebody was going to die today, at the hands of a vampire or in the jaws of a monster. She couldn't prevent her own tears from sliding down her cheeks now. She wished she had said goodbye to Charlie. She wished she had told him that she loved him. And what about Joy? She might never know what had happened to her son.

"You have to stay behind," she wept.

He only said that he couldn't not go. How could he sit at home while Jake was in danger? "This is like the Salem witch trials. You're scared, which makes me scared, which makes you more scared— It's like a snowball of fear." He stood and brushed off his pants, sucked up the mucus in his nose with a loud _snork,_ and spat a huge wad of phlegm onto the ground.

"You're so disgusting."

As they progressed along the trail to Sam's house, they found more paw prints. First they saw just one here, one there, spaced ten or more paces apart, just enough to confirm that it had recently passed this way, and then there were short chains of prints, a dozen or so in a row. Quil knelt to examine the placement of fore feet and hind feet. Reaching into his packet, he pulled out a folded piece of white paper and declared that the wolf had been running, not walking, through here. He'd printed out a guide to animal prints from the internet.

"Disgusting, but smart," she amended.

They followed the trail almost to Sam's backyard, where the paw prints diverged from the path. In the trees just beyond the yard, they were appalled to discover hundreds of prints in what had once been a mossy glade, but which was now a well-trampled corral. Quil looked for signs of a rope or chain. Bella looked for carcasses of its meals. Neither was present, but they did find a muddy white sock at the base of a large hemlock.

The trees were thick enough to screen this trampled area from the house. Quil wondered if Sam's family knew about the giant wolf. Bella said probably not, but she was pretty sure Emily knew, and she wondered if Sam had sold his soul to the devil to gain control of the monster. Quileutes have no devil in our legends, countered Quil. And there still remained the question of why Sam wanted to have such a weapon at his disposal. Maybe, Bella said, he was trying to gain control of the tribe. Getting rid of Jacob could open up the Chief's spot.

It's not like a kingdom, Quil said. You get elected to be Chief. But yeah, when Billy gets too old to run for re-election, people will probably vote for Jacob. They've never voted for anyone other than a Black, for at least five generations.

"Well, there you go," said Bella, putting her hands on her hips. She was pleased to have figured this out. "All the more reason to get rid of him." They looked at the sock closely. It was definitely a man's sock; not a child's or a woman's.

A rustling in the trees startled them. Quil grabbed Bella's arm and yanked her behind the hemlock tree as the sound of cracking twigs and rain spattering from the movement of branches became louder. As she peeked through the green needles, Quil reached over his shoulder for the rifle, ready to whip it into position. "If we die," he whispered, "sorry about your dad. He's okay, I guess."

"You guess?"

He frowned at her. "Your turn."

"Shut up."

Something large was moving behind a maple sapling, obscured by the large, soft green leaves of its first spring growth. As it came closer, they could see long, swinging black hair, a slim leg, a white hand pushing the branches aside, and then— A young woman stepped awkwardly over a log, carrying a laundry basket against her hip. As they watched, she bent and retrieved another sock from the ground. It was green. They hadn't noticed it. She put it in her laundry basket and headed straight for them— or for the white sock on the other side of their tree. When Quil leaped out with the rifle pointed at her, she dropped the basket and screamed.

"Hands up," said Quil.

Her hands were already in the air.

"Bella, basket." Quil jerked the rifle at her, and she scurried out from behind the tree and kicked the basket over. _Lots_ of muddy laundry spilled out, jeans, shorts, shirts, underwear, socks, a jacket, and even a few shoes.

"Bella?" said the young woman.

"No talking," said Quil.

"Are you crazy?" said Bella. "Put that down!"

"No talking." He eyed the woman's face, chalky with fear, lined with heavy scars. "You must be Emily."

She nodded, hands still in the air.

"Put it down," said Bella, in the sternest voice she could muster.

"Take us to Jacob," he commanded.

"What?" said Emily.

"We know you have him. We know everything."

"We do?" said Bella, and Quil glared at her.

"Everything," he asserted. "So you might as well tell us."

Emily looked sideways at Bella, who stood beside her with her mouth open. "Does he know how to use that?" she whispered.

"He can hit a beer can at five paces."

Emily gauged the distance between them as a little less than five paces. Roughly, she grabbed Bella's upper arms and jerked her in front of her own body. Then she began backing toward the yard and the open. Quil cut her off, though, and motioned for her to retreat along the path she had taken to get to their clearing. As they passed through the damp woods, farther and farther from the house, wet branches smacked the back of Bella's head. The young maples, she noticed sourly, were extra sloshy. Emily was walking sideways, looking ahead but still gripping Bella's arms and watching Quil as he followed.

"You are so fucking dead," she said. Her unscarred eyelid narrowed with her scowl.

"Bella, watch for prints," said Quil.

"Kind of hard when I'm being dragged _backward_ through the bushes! This was not part of the plan."

"I have a new plan," he said lazily. "I'm feeling inspired."

Emily pulled them all farther and farther into the woods. The trees became heavier, larger, and the sunlight barely made it to the forest floor in some places. But in every sunny patch they passed, Bella saw dozens of wolf prints.

"Quil, this is insane," said Bella.

He opened his mouth, turned his head so that his left eye was toward her, and gave a huge, slow wink.

"I saw that," said Emily. She stopped walking and took one hand off Bella's arm to wipe her forehead. "Quil. You're Quil. You're, uh... How are you feeling lately? Warmish, maybe?"

"I feel peachy," he snarled.

"Is this a joke? Bella, do something."

"Put it down," she said sternly.

Quil twirled the rifle on his trigger finger, which made the girls scream and duck. Then he leaned on it like it was a finely inlaid walking stick, crossing his ankles in a debonair way, his elbow against the butt and the tip of the barrel sinking into the soft earth.

"Go," whispered Emily, and somehow Bella knew, in the mysterious way that girls know these things, that Emily had a plan, too. She lunged for Quil, knocking him to the ground with the element of surprise and falling on top of him, just as Emily lunged for the rifle. Moments later, Bella knew, in the mysterious way that only she seemed to know things—which was not, unfortunately, very often—that she had made the wrong choice.

"You got mud up your barrel," said Emily, swinging the rifle around on them. Her undamaged eye—the left—shut tight as she stared down the sights at them with her unblinking right eye. With the wooden butt nestled between her pectoral muscle and her right shoulder, with her finger on the trigger and her knees loose but firm, with her slim body utterly stilled, she looked like she could hit a beer can at a lot farther than five paces.

"Why are you sneaking around in the woods?" she demanded.

Bella's pants were soaked through in most places now. She shivered on her wet bottom next to a patch of small, golden mushrooms that might have been pretty under other circumstances. Looking around, she saw more signs of deep forest: red and brown striped shelf fungus on tree trunks, a nurse log covered in cedar saplings, and more varieties of ferns than she had seen in the woods closer to the village. She wondered how far away they were now. Probably, she feared, too far for anyone to hear her if she screamed.

"Why are you doing laundry in the woods?" Quil countered. "You Snow White or something? Picking up after elves?"

"Dwarves," said Bella under her breath. "Wrong fairy tale."

Emily paid her no attention. "Why are you so interested in bear prints?"

"Bear," said Quil. "Ha." He sat on his bottom, too, surely soaked. "We know it's not a bear."

"Of course it's a bear."

Quil pulled the white paper from his pocket, unfolded it, and tossed it at her feet. "Wikipedia says otherwise."

If it weren't for the rifle pointed at their heads, Bella would have laughed at his showmanship.

Emily said nothing. She didn't even glance at the paper.

In the dim, green heights overhead, an owl hooted.

"Bella," said Quil, never taking his eyes off Emily, "give me your shirt."

"What? No."

"Gimme the shirt. Not the T-shirt; the flannel one."

Beneath her father's old brown fleece jacket, Bella was wearing one of her usual outfits, a T-shirt under a too-large, unbuttoned flannel Oxford. Carefully, looking at the steel barrel of the rifle, Bella shrugged out of the fleece. "Nooooo," said Emily slowly, the way one might preemptively scold a dog who was staring at steak on a countertop. "Nooooo," she said, but Bella kept moving, and soon Quil was in possession of an orange and brown plaid heap.

Bella stared at it. The pattern was rather nicer than usual. Kind of understated. Nicely woven. High quality cloth, too, she thought. As Quil began to tear it into strips, she realized it was Charlie's shirt.

"What are you doing?" said Emily, swinging the rifle toward him.

"The barrel is filled with mud," he said, tying the strips together. "It would be unsafe to fire it now."

"You're bluffing."

"It would backfire. Blow your own guts out."

"Ha," she laughed. "Joke's on you. Because this thing, all along, you asshole, is not loaded." So saying, she pumped the firing mechanism and cracked the barrel away from the butt to show the empty chamber.

Bella blinked at her. Then she slapped Quil's arms and face, growling, "You scared the shit out of me!" and while Emily was laughing, Quil leapt up and grabbed her hands. Quicker than Bella would have thought possible, he had knotted them together behind her back in a plaid cotton rope.

Emily kicked his shins. She kneed him in the groin, and when he fell to one knee, she drove her heel into his chest, knocking him backward, and took off running.

* * *

 _END OF CHAPTER_

* * *

 _Hi readers!_

 _I have another double chapter for you here. This is the first half. The second half will come within a week. Till then, I hope you have enjoyed this part. Questions..._

1\. What do you think about Joy and Charlie's argument? Do Bella and Quil have a hand in it? Who is at fault? How and why? What should these four do now?

2\. What do you think of Quil and Bella's plan in general, and Quil's idea to take Emily hostage in particular?

3\. Where would you say Bella's openness about the "wolf monster" and her reticence about vampires, as far as Quil is concerned, falls on the moral spectrum?

 _Thank you again for reading. I'd love to have your thoughts! I will be excited to hear from you! And I'm finishing up Chapter 9, which will be full of surprises, I hope._

 _Yours, AmandaForks_

 _P.S. SERIOUSLY, I need some help with Charlie and Joy. I think it's on him to make things right. But how? He's naturally quiet, undemonstrative. Maybe even awkward when it comes to this, uh, "stuff," that Joy is more open about. She hit his weak spot, and though he hurt her unintentionally, he definitely messed up. How can he fix things? SHOULD he fix things? SHOULD Charlie and Joy continue to date? I'm hoping yes. But I am open to you all's opinions, and I truly NEED some suggestions for how Charlie could make things better. Help? Thank you! (I just followed the Inspiration Fairy, tra la la, and she led me into a swamp. Thanks a lot, Inspiration Fairy. ;-)  
_


	9. Chapter 9

**Chapter Nine**

 **"Lost and Found"**

* * *

 _Author's Note: This chapter is dedicated to Darkchilde._

* * *

Half an hour later, Bella was pulling hard at the oars of a rowboat while the muddy, ice-cold waters of the Quillayute River lapped at the little ten-foot vessel in which she rode with Quil and their captive. "I am so, so sorry," Bella kept saying. Quil flicked the flannel end of the rope by which he controlled Emily, who kept her chin up and gazed over the river. It was choppier once they reached the middle. The oars were heavy and the force of the current was heavier. Bella tried to aim the prow upstream to avoid presenting their broadside to the current, but no matter how hard she pulled, the boat kept heading downstream instead of across it. Emily looked like she _really_ wanted to give Bella some advice, but she remained silent.

After felling Quil, Emily hadn't gotten very far. Not far at all. Quil had been standing on the other end of his rope. He'd sheathed his father's rifle, reeled her in, and said that he hadn't planned on this, but he was glad, very glad, that they had run into her. He was just trying to find Jacob, and he hoped she would understand. She kicked his shins again.

"This is a shitty plan, Quil," said Bella, struggling against the current. The more nervous she felt, the more she cursed. "Nobody said anything about involving other people. Not to mention threatening them with a fucking _gun._ Not cool. Think. Who's got Jacob?"

"Sam," he said.

She flung her arm at Emily, losing hold of an oar, which pivoted sharply in its oarlock and banged against the side of the boat. "Whose girlfriend is this?"

"Sam's."

"And who's going to kill us?"

He frowned at her, throwing his own arm toward Emily as if she were no more than a useful object. "Gold mine. Huge clue. Bargaining chip. What would you not do to get Jacob back safe?"

Bella pinched the bridge of her nose, hard, like she had seen Charlie do. It did not bring her much relief.

After they'd recaptured Emily, Quil had directed her to follow the paw prints. They had led to the river. A slimy-looking bank on the opposite side suggested that the wolf monster had swum this thing and crawled out on the other side. They debated going back for Bella's truck, driving to the bridge, driving west, and trying to find the trail again, but they decided it was too risky. They mind never find it. Or someone in town might notice their hostage. So they tossed a rock into the river to see how fast it was moving, and the expanding rings made by its splash quickly vanished in the swirl of the current. A stick they tossed in was swept away fast. Then Quil had spotted something shiny nestled in the bushes upstream, and they walked up the riverbank and discovered—oh, rapture!—a boat. With oars in it, no less.

It was very small. There were three metal bench seats—prow, middle, and stern—just enough room for three people. The bottom held about six inches of rainwater and leaves, but there was an empty coffee can for a bailer. Quil made Bella scoop it out while he stood on the bank with his captive. "How about _I_ hold the rope?" she suggested, but Quil said they couldn't risk it. He called her a rebel sympathizer and told her to bail faster.

"This is stealing," she complained. "Maybe grand theft. Stealing a car is grand theft. Maybe stealing a boat is the same. It's a vehicle."

"Whether it's grand theft or regular theft depends on the value of the vehicle," he replied. "This boat's bottom of the barrel."

"Well, somebody's going to miss it."

"It's Sam's," Emily sighed.

"Oh, good," said Quil, but Bella said, "One more reason for him to kill us."

Now she struggled with the oars in the middle of the wide, swift, cold Quillayute River. This was the reason why Forks was called _FORKS._ There were actually three rivers coming together near town—the Sol Duc, the Bogachiel, the Calawah—to form their monstrous offspring, the Quillayute. It was why Forks was known for great sport fishing. She knew the rivers' names from Charlie's fish stories, but she had never been on one of the rivers. She had never even rowed a boat before, and she knew instantly that she was pretty bad at it.

 _How deep is this?_ she wondered. _How far to the ocean? Are we going to end up there?_ Shoulders aching, she pulled and pulled against the current. "How about you row?" she said. Initially, Quil said no; he had to guard Emily; but Emily said, "Where am I going to go? You row, or we'll get picked up by the Coast Guard. This boat isn't registered, you've got a rifle, I'm tied up, and your ass is going to jail if you don't _take the oars."_

It was true that they were losing the fight with the current, slipping downriver toward the Coast Guard station. Bella saw their two white and orange rescue boats moored beyond a fenced portion of the bank. A couple of sailors stood on the dock, facing the ocean, talking. Bella began to wonder what an incident report for a rescue and investigation by a branch of the U. S. government's armed services would look like. Probably many, many pages.

They rearranged themselves. Quil managed to row them upstream. Sitting in the stern beside Emily, Bella apologized again.

"I am so sorry. So sorry. Jacob's been gone for weeks."

"I know."

"And we're so scared for him. We think he's out here somewhere—"

"Probably," Emily sighed.

"—and he might need our help—"

"Probably not."

"—and you can understand, right? If it was Sam, wouldn't you try anything to find him?"

"Not _this._ "

Bella squeezed her eyes shut, thinking. Surely Emily knew about the wolf monster—knew unfortunately a lot about it, especially its claws. Why would Sam let it attack Emily? How much control did he have over this beast? Maybe Jacob was in more danger than she'd thought. Emily knew. So hopefully she wouldn't think Bella was crazy.

"The, uh..." she began. "Your injury. Not a bear, right?"

Emily paled.

"Please help us." She scooted closer, since Emily was shivering. She had no jacket, wearing only jeans and a thin, pink, turtleneck sweater, with her long black hair hanging in her face. She smudged her forehead against her shoulder in an attempt to get it out of her eyes. "May I?" said Bella. She brushed it aside for her and hesitantly put an arm around her. "You know about the thing, right? The thing that's not a bear."

"I can't say."

"Sam told me not to say anything either. But I saw it."

"Really?" said Emily dryly. "What did it look like?"

"Wolf. It was a giant wolf."

The more details Bella gave, the more uncomfortable Emily looked. And then, somehow—maybe it was the biting cold that made her want to be close to someone, or maybe it was the fierce wash of four rivers, spilling everything they had to the sea—or maybe it was just hearing that word, _wolf,_ on someone else's lips—she crumbled. Then grinned. Then lit up like a rainbow.

"I didn't tell you!" In fact, she almost giggled, cocking her head to bump Bella's shoulder. "You found out on your own! Not my fault. What color was it?"

"Red. Reddish brown."

"Ooh!" She seemed to find that particularly thrilling. "Where?"

"The path behind Sam's house."

"What did it do?"

"Stared at me. Like, forever."

"Really?" Her cheeks bloomed pink. "That's so nice! Now you'll be one of us."

"Us?"

"Oh, you don't know that part yet? Oopsies!"

"Wait, what?"

But Emily wouldn't say more. She just sat there and smiled in a way that seemed out of place for a person tied up in a small boat rowed by a punk who had, less than an hour, ago, pointed a gun—albeit unloaded—at her. She smiled like she wasn't in the middle of an rushing river only half a mile from the ocean. Quil kept pulling, and at last the boat bumped into the north bank of the river just where they guessed the wolf had climbed out, and sure enough, there were paw prints in the mud. Quil hopped out and tugged on the lip of the bow, bringing Sam's boat halfway onto the land. Then he, already muddy, dropped to his knees to examine the prints. Bella helped Emily climb out, and when they turned around they saw Quil, still on his knees, leaning over the river and taking long gulps of water.

"What are you doing?" cried Bella. "That's dirty!"

He looked confused, water dripping from his chin. "Not dirty. Not bad dirty, not like garbage. I need a drink; I threw up back there, remember?"

Emily stared at him and said, "Oh, nooooooo..."

Quil picked up the end of his flannel and flicked it. "Giddy-up," he said, and they climbed the slimy bank.

The forest north of the river was marshy and dense. They waded through a lowland of cattails, streamlets, birch saplings, sharp-edged sedges, mud, skunk cabbage, and more icy cold water, up to their knees in spots. The skunk cabbage plants had long, soft, gray-green leaves and yellow flowers that smelled god-awful, like rotting vegetables. They grew in patches, and their scent was overwhelming; Bella held her shirt over her nose and thought about how Emily probably wished she could do that, too. And there were enormous tree stumps showing that once, this area had been logged.

Bella's thighs ached with the effort of pulling her boots out of the sucking mud, step after step. Quil slogged into the lead, Emily following, her hands still bound. He had the good sense not to drag her too fast, though, so she wouldn't trip, unable to break a face-first fall. Paw prints here and there, in the mud beside the rivulets, kept them going, but after half an hour or so, Bella began to wonder if they should have bypassed this bog and looked for the print trail to resume on the other side.

"I hate Sam," said Quil, as if the landscape were his fault. "Hate this swamp. Hate this tree." He kicked a rotten stump with the side of his foot, looking like a filthy ninja, and it fell over with a slow, slurping sound, lifting a mess of roots and earth higher than their heads. Bella stared at the water dripping from the woody tangle. Emily said, "Oh, nooooooo..." again. She was shivering, knee deep in a stream. Quil kicked another tree stump and a mess of frightened frogs exploded from it like a green, chirping firework. It scared him and he kicked it again, reflexively, while Emily snorted with nervous laughter.

"Not my fault, right? I didn't tell you. Hey, Bella, you want to come over sometime this week? Watch a movie or something?"

"Uh, sure," said Bella. Emily's giggles were starting to freak her out. And the small of her back felt wet and slimy. When something dribbled beneath the waistband of her jeans into her underwear and she caught the coppery tang of blood, she realized that the frozen hamburger in her backpack was melting.

 _Now I smell like wolf food. Super._

* * *

It must have been mid-afternoon when they emerged from the swamp. Overhead, the sun had begun to burn through the clouds. Overheated momentarily, Bella took off her backpack and Charlie's fleece and lay on her back on the first solid patch of land they came to. She didn't care about the wet moss soaking through her shirt and hair; she was already drenched. Emily leaned against a tree, breathing heavily. Quil, exceedingly pissed, tied his end of the rope to that tree and stalked back to the edge of the swamp. They had lost the trail.

"God, I'm so tired," gasped Emily. "You got anything to eat?"

"Not exactly."

"I need some meat," said Quil, returning. He punched his fist into a rotten log and pulled out a handful of crumbling but dry material. "Get some sticks." Quickly, he created a friction-based fire starter, poking some dry material into a crevice in a half-dry stick and rubbing another stick over it, startlingly fast, until smoke appeared, and then a spark. "Where's the sticks?" he snarled, and Bella scrambled to gather a pile. Following his lead, she stuck her hand in the hole he'd made and pulled more dry wood chips from the log. A few minutes later, they were roasting Charlie's smoked sausages on sticks. Bella held two sticks, one for Emily, who had scooted as far away from Quil as she could.

"Give him some space," she urged Bella.

Quil didn't want to talk about how he'd learned to start a fire. It was just something he knew, he said. He'd read it in a book once. But who cares? The important thing was meat. And finding Jacob. Also, meat.

He ate four sausages, and when he wasn't snarling anymore and the girls had warmed up, they resumed their search, pacing the edge of the swamp until they found a print. In a mossy forest environment again, the prints were few and hard to find. Bella wasn't sure if they were heading north anymore; she couldn't hear the sound of the ocean and the ground was rising. Maybe they were heading east.

She began to wonder what they would do after they found Jacob. Give the wolf monster the thawing meat? Talk to it? Was it a sentient being? What if Sam were there? What if Jacob were injured or too exhausted or sick to move? What if the wolf monster attacked them? What if they met the hiker-shredding vampire? And how were they going to get home? What if they got lost?

 _We're already lost._

She had to blink back a tear. She wasn't sure how many miles they had walked, but given the time they'd spent, it had to be getting close to ten. Her feet hurt, but she didn't want to take off her boots and check for blisters. What could she do about that? Nothing. After another hour, she had no more thoughts beyond straining her eyes for prints, the dull refrain of Jacob's name, and the force of will required to put one muddy foot in front of the other.

When she had awakened that morning, she couldn't have imagined how much her life would change this day. That morning, she could not have known that surprises greater than the existence of vampires, greater even than discovering a magical Quileute wolf legend, were waiting for her in these deep woods. But when she stepped into a clearing at the top of a long rise and they all paused to rest, her life did exactly that.

It changed.

First, she felt a dizzying exhaustion, feeling her breath rasp in her chest and her pulse thrum in her ears. Emily sank to the ground and said, "My sweater. Oh, my prettiest sweater. It's ruined," and she started to cry in huge, gulping sobs. To Bella, the sounds were muted, as if from far away or underwater. She felt further detached, as if her mind were floating away, when she looked around the clearing and realized she had been here before, a year ago. _I can't,_ she thought. _I can't look at this right now._ But she couldn't help it. She saw the first blue lupines of early spring blooming, the blue delphinium, the white avalanche lilies, and the softly waving grasses. She saw the dark pines across the field and remembered emerging from them with Edward. She saw herself lying on the ground with him, their hands clasped. She saw herself with her forehead pressed to his. She breathed the air he expelled unnecessarily. He did not have to exhale. _Everything about me invites you in,_ he had said. _My face. My voice. Even my smell._ Was that what he was doing to her? She thought she was falling in love. Tears spilled from her eyes and she turned to Quil, needing a hug. But Quil frightened her. He stood utterly still. She followed his eyes and saw a man standing on the other side of the clearing where a moment ago, there had been no one.

"Oh, God," said Bella and Emily at the same time. "No." Then they looked at one another, their eyes widening.

In a blink, the man was in the center of the field, twirling a sprig of grass between his thumb and first finger. He was dressed in the tattered finery of other eras, a crushed purple velvet jacket, striped bell bottom pants, a white fedora. Gold chains lay on his bare chest in a sparkling waterfall of personal adornment. _Too much?_ he may have thought when getting dressed. Or when collecting them. _No. Never too much._ In another blink, he stood slightly less than five paces in front of them. His red eyes were bright. Quil flicked his eyes to Bella, uncertainly, then snapped his rifle over his shoulder and into position.

"No," said the vampire with a smile. "No need."

"Laurent," said Bella. She tried to keep her voice from shaking. Tried to turn his attention away from her friends.

The vampire eyed Quil, his nose wrinkling, and let his gaze linger longer on Emily, still sitting on the ground. He inhaled and smiled wider. "You two... intrigue me. Long time since I felt that."

Emily clenched her jaw and lifted her chin.

"Laurent." Bella took a tiny step toward him. "You look... well. How are—"

"I am unchanged." When he tipped his head sideways, his dreadlocks brushed his shoulder. "You are, as ever... Sugar cane. White orchid." He inhaled again. "And now a wild scent, North American rodent... Skunk? Interesting. Sweet and sour. And something else... Ground chuck. Again, I am intrigued. Twice in one day! I am so fortunate."

Bella's pulse hammered so hard it was difficult to think. "The Cullens—" she began.

"Are gone. I have been to their house. You know they put white sheets over the furniture? How... quaint."

"They're coming back," she bluffed. "Edward—"

"Has left you here all alone."

"She's not alone," growled Quil.

Laurent seemed to move in slow motion as he turned his head. It scared Bella to realize that this was his way of pretending to be human. He'd overshot the mark. Quil was trembling slightly now, clearly sensing the threat. _You get away from him_ , Bella thought. She stepped between the vampire and her friend, which made Laurent laugh. Silver fillings flashed in his mouth as he lifted his head, his brow sparkling in the sunlight. Emily struggled to her feet, her expression cold and calm. The vampire's eyes returned to her face.

"So interesting. Thank you, Bella. You bring me joy." He looked around the clearing as one might gaze around a grand ballroom. "But I am here on business. Business, then pleasure. Victoria. She sent me to... inquire after you."

Bella felt suddenly hollow. She tried to make a sound, but only her lips moved to shape that name.

"Yes. As a favor, I came. And now that the Cullens are gone, I think she will be very disappointed."

 _Why?_ she mouthed.

"Because I am enchanted. Deeply so. Were they going to share you, the Cullens? I have never scented your like. Had they been taking their time to reach an... agreement? How to do it. A little for all. So much for one." He took her hand and lifted it to his lips in an outdated extension of courtesy, of admiration. "I will make it nice for you. I will... savor you as you deserve. Victoria would... not. You come. It is best. You give yourself to me."

This was the end, thought Bella. As the chill from his fingertips seemed to spread through her body, she hoped her bladder would hold so she could die with dignity. When she felt his cold lips on her forehead, she managed to voice what she felt would be her last word: _"Run."_

Quil lunged for Laurent, but the vampire flung his body away with a lazy motion of his hand. With a yelp, Quil was thrown into the bushes at the edge of the forest. Bella prayed he would roll downhill, fast and far. Emily screamed for him and struggled against her rope as Bella shivered, knees weak. "Stand _up_ , Bella," said Emily. "Stand." Laurent lifted the waterfall of Emily's black hair the way he might inspect a length of fine silk and drew his nose across her scarred cheek, murmuring, "New." Then he stiffened and Bella heard an enormous huff of air behind her shoulder.

Emily swayed and dropped. Fainted, thought Bella. She burst into a run, hoping to draw Laurent's attention across the meadow. Her muscles ached, and the pack on her back thumped against her body. "Me!" she shouted. "Me!" To her despair, she saw Quil reemerge from the trees, his face pale with panic, his steps slow and unsteady. He staggered toward Laurent as if in great pain, as if he could barely breathe. An easy mark; Bella understood that immediately. She screamed the vampire's name with a desperation that tore at her throat. She even took off her backpack and threw it at him, but Laurent didn't look at her. He was slowly backing away from the tree line.

There, ducking under the low branches of the pines, prowling from the shadows with lethal grace, was the hulking form of the monster. The red wolf.

"I don't believe it," gasped Laurent.

Bella froze. The branches quivered as a _second_ monster slunk into the meadow. A black wolf. Then a third, a fourth. One brown, one gray as a storm cloud. And a fifth, leaner and smaller, a silver predator. There was no sign of Sam, puppet master of beasts. And they were hovering over Emily, unconscious.

"No!" shouted Bella. She rushed at the wolves even as tears spilled down her face, as her vision blurred and her lungs burned. She thought of Charlie, the way he had burst into her room when she had the nightmare about the drowning deer, the way he had scooped her up and held her. The word _Daddy_ flashed through her mind, though she had never, ever called him that. She saw again the photos in his album, photos of him holding her when she was one day old, a mere pink berry of a child. _Daddy_. It is perhaps in a child's last moments that she thinks of these things: a parent's care, the love that brought her through all her days to this point of sacrifice. Bella's only thoughts were of his arms, and this primal instinct, this deep memory of comfort, sent her flying across the meadow to wrap her own arms around Emily, to shelter her—a woman she barely knew—from death.

The black wolf bared its teeth, and the red one barked and growled. Her heart stuttered; her ears rang. She threw herself over Emily's body just as the wolves pounced. And when she didn't feel their claws, she opened her eyes and saw that the wolves had leaped over her. She saw Laurent whirl and run. The wolves ran after him, snarling, fangs bared, tearing up the earth with their massive paws. The brown one swung hard to the right, cutting off Laurent's wild change of path. Dirt sprayed over Quil, who fell to the ground, swallowed by the tall grass. His body thrashed; he cried out in a pain so terrible that it made Bella sob, just once, before she steeled herself, her back to him, and bent over Emily's knots. Her wrists were chafed but she was stirring now. Bella got the flannel untied and helped Emily to her feet. _"Run,"_ she said. No time for secrets anymore. _"Run. Vampire. Go."_ She shoved Emily into the trees and turned to help Quil.

But Quil was gone. In the meadow there was only a flattened patch of grass, shredded earth, and blood. It darkened the dirt and slid down the stems of the grass. She stared at a white lily, stained red now, and could no longer control her sobs. He was gone.

The wolves were growling, snarling and snapping somewhere beyond the meadow; She saw the pine tops sway. Laurent must be killing them, she thought, and it pained her to think that such beautiful animals, monsters though they be, would meet their ends at his cold hands. But perhaps the wolves would delay him. Perhaps she could still save Emily.

She plunged into the ferns at the edge of the meadow, struggling through them to the woods, skittering downhill, praying that Emily had run in this direction. The slope increased her momentum; soon she was leaping instead of running, her stride long, her boots skidding through moss and wet leaves on the forest floor. _Where's Emily? Where is she?_ Her eyes flicked left and right in the gloom. _If we can find a stream,_ she thought. _Water runs low. Find the bottom of this hill. Find a stream._ Surely the vampire, the wolves, or both would be on their trail soon, and water might be their only hope of erasing their scent.

Branches crackled and snapped behind her. A glance over her shoulder revealed something huge and fast, a flash of red fur. Tears poured down her face. She heard Emily call her name, saw Emily crouching behind a tree, and she looked up, hoping for a last glimpse of sky before she died, thankful that the monster had chosen her and run past Emily. Then she heard a different voice calling her name. A hallucination, surely. A voice she would have hoped to hear at the end. She leaped over a log—almost—and tumbled down the hill, disoriented, quaking.

"Bella!" said the voice. "Bella!"

And then it was Jacob slowing her roll, taking her into his arms and kneeling with her, holding her on his lap, wrapping his arms around her so tight. _I'm dead,_ thought Bella. _I'm glad it's ove_ r. Maybe she and Jacob were together in Heaven, the monster having eaten him, too. "Oh, Jake, I'm so sorry!" she sobbed.

"No, honey," he said. "It's okay."

"We're dead."

"No."

"Quil is—"

"No." He held her hand against his chest, over his heart, smiling down at her. His skin was warm. She looked at her pale hand on his tan skin and realized he was stark naked, and she was sitting on his lap.

"Stop, stop," laughed Jacob, but she couldn't stop because she wasn't aware that she was screaming uncontrollably. "Stop," he said, kissing her all over her face until at last she quieted, trembling in his arms. She clutched his shoulders.

"We have to run," she said. "Run."

"It's over now. It's over."

Above her, farther up the hill, she saw the black wolf with Emily. It nuzzled her; she pressed her face into its fur and sighed. The brown wolf trotted past, not more than ten feet away, and Paul Lahote strode past as well, also naked, but covering his backside and groin with a couple of large maple leaves. He switched them back to front, front to back, in a strip show tease that, thanks to his quickness, revealed nothing but his smirk.

"She's screaming because she saw your junk," he said to Jake.

Both Bella and Jacob blushed bright red. "No, I didn't," she mumbled. "And I'm not going to look."

"Fuck off," said Jake, hugging Bella closer on his lap, mumbling into her hair, "You better not." To Paul he added, "You forgot the matches."

"And your pants," said a voice behind her. She turned to see Sam, out of breath, holding Emily's hand. "I wish you could remember some pants." Sam, Bella was relieved to see, had pants. He also tossed a pair at Jacob.

Paul shivered into his second skin and trotted after the brown wolf.

"I'm going to pile it up," said Sam. "I'll take the girls home when it's burned. Then you help Emb talk some sense into Quil because he thinks he did this all by himself."

A sixth wolf, chocolate brown, pranced down the hill like a reindeer, or like a dog wearing costume booties if that dog really, really liked booties. It scratched its back on a cedar sapling, and when the tree keeled over it jumped into the swinging, swishing green branches, dodging, growling, chasing its tail. There was a scrap of purple velvet hanging from its teeth.

Jacob nodded. Sam and Emily herded the chocolate brown wolf away and climbed the hill again. Bella leaned her forehead against Jacob's chest and tried to regain her breath. Tried to reorganize the things she'd filed in her mind under "real" and "unreal."

"I missed you," Jacob said. He put a finger under her chin to tip her face up and kissed her. As she returned the kiss, she put her hands into his hair at the nape of his neck and realized he'd cut it short, very short.

"Is it okay?" he whispered.

"Of course."

"I know you liked it."

"I liked _you._ I mean, I do. Oh, Jake, I—"

"I got your note. I slept in my bed last night for the first time in weeks. Had nightmares about skunks, huge stinking skunks."

"Sorry."

"Now you smell like hamburger. And the river. And skunk cabbage." He pressed his nose into her hair, snuffling along her neck in a way that sent shivers down her spine. "And wood smoke. And fear. And bravery."

"No."

"You tried to save everybody. You were so brave."

Bella closed her eyes. She hoped she could lock those golden words away in her heart. Her body trembled with nerves, with relief, with shock—with inexplicable laughter. Jacob held her so tight, running his face, his nose, his lips, over her hair, neck, arms, face, ears, shoulders. He was trembling, too, with tears. "I missed you so much. You smell like cinnamon and Quil's house and my garage. You smell like me, from before." It made him cry more.

"Shh," she said, using the words he had long said to her. "It's okay."

"I missed you," he wept, his forehead pressed to her neck, his breath warm on her chest. "I missed you so much. I thought you'd hate me. If you knew."

"No. Never."

Paul walked past, carrying two large maple leaves and a book of matches. "He's crying because he knows you saw his junk."

"I did not!" she screeched, causing Jacob to put his hands over his ears and cringe. "Nobody's junk was viewed by me ever!"

"Never?" said Paul. "You mean you never saw anybody's—"

Jacob tried to snarl at him, but his nose was so stuffy from crying that he only made Paul laugh.

"Right over here, Bella," said Paul. "These leaves are so heavy. I don't know if I can carry them much longer."

"Go away!" she screeched, her eyes shut tight.

Paul walked up the hill without his leaves. And without an audience. Jacob kissed her again and she looked at his face. Suddenly, he was older. The bones of his face were more like those of his father. She saw the weight on him as clearly as she might have seen a burden on his shoulders: the weight of the magical Quileute wolf monster spirit ancestor _thing._ A responsibility. A danger. A calling. A pull to the forest. A pull to protect. The legends came back to her as she looked into his dark eyes, still swimming with tears. This weight on his young shoulders, so suddenly broadened and roped with muscle, was the weight of centuries, the weight of the river in its valley, and a secret like the shadow of the raven with the sun in its beak. She lay her palm on his cheek.

"I got your note," he whispered, lifting her hand and placing a warm kiss in her palm. "And I love you, too."

Those words, too, she wanted to lock away in her heart. To keep them forever. But first she gave them back to him, and he to her, and back again. Soon she was a snotty mess, rubbing her nose on her shirt, hiccuping with exhaustion, with tears and laughter, and Jacob was holding her. He was found at last. They were found together. And maybe, thought Bella, her heart was found, too. It didn't hurt anymore. She gave it to him for safekeeping, and she knew, by the light in his eyes, that he had given her his own heart long ago. She took his warm hand and curled it, held it tight between her own.

* * *

End of Chapter

* * *

 _Oh, dear readers, I hope you enjoyed that chapter. Thank you for reading. Thanks to Jane for reviewing. Please let me know your thoughts._

 _ **1**. Are you pleased with the way things turned out for Jake and Bella here? What do you think they will still have to learn, discuss, or understand about one another? **2.** What is your impression of Emily's character? **3.** Favorite parts? **4.** Funny parts?_

 _Darkchilde said she had a crummy day and wished for a chapter. I hope this makes you smile. And I hope you all will review because that makes me smile, too, and I had a day like darkchilde's! Let us spread kindness. Hugs to you all. Previews to reviewers!  
_

 _AmandaForks_

 _Hey, Darkechilde, what did you think? :-)_


	10. Chapter 10

Dear Readers,

Hello again! I am glad to metaphorically see you. I'm sorry I couldn't respond to each of your reviews from the last chapter. Please know, though, that I appreciate them all and am encouraged to keep writing. You have so many thoughtful reflections and creative ideas to share. It is inspiring and rewarding. Keeps me going. Let me say a group thank you here for anyone I may have missed, so you'll know that I know you're out there!

Feel free to scroll down a bit if you just want to dive into this new chapter! Or maybe read my thank you note...

Thanks to klarsen117 (many reviews, many thanks), castaway11 (glad you enjoyed BG, too!) , silkyjacob, readingtilldawn, brandileigh2003, Amanthya, PoisonIvy533, KyleEverdeen (Thank you for your words about the hot and cold symbolism! I agree.), dreamertotheend, BugRhesom, Nesa, Ariel-Scarlett (Thanks for answering all my questions. I liked your thoughts on Emily's character), Jibrah (your take on Ch + J is helpful. Liking the grand gesture idea. And thanks for multi-chapter comments!), teamjacob0729, alixandria (thanks for reviewing every chapter!), LlamaMathilde (thanks for the idea for Ch's grand gesture), joyful journey (Loved the ? you posed re: J relating to B when he doesn't need to "fix" her), lectri (prancing! yes!), Darkchilde (glad to see you! I hope you get your wish. And I'm glad you enjoyed YOUR chapter.), jane (glad you liked Q + B), nothinwring2013 (screaming? awwwwww...), Amanthya (again! Thank you!), PastOneonta (Every time I see your comments, I get excited. So thoughful. Detailed. I eat them up!), corkykellums (Brave Bella, yay!), MissPoisonedAddiction (You are so sweet. Thank you. Thank you for all those detailed answers.), Chickka (glad you liked the funny Paul parts), teacupdestiny (your notes are always a delight. Glad you like Ch + J.), ezinmaful (Thanks for your detailed review! I'm pondering your thoughts about imprinting and emily's char.), pingou (dear, dear pingou. fair as a star. thank you for thoughts on Charlie's love, imprinting, Emily's loneliness, Brave Bella), yuuram2fangirl (thank you for your detailed comments! I appreciate knowing the plot seemed rushed to you. Working on that. Glad you like Embry!), LCB (always glad to see you! You have a good day, too!), Moondancer1818 (glad you liked the ending), sonotalady (sturdy. Yes. Good word for me to keep in mind. Love it.), MelkiSihou (thanks for the details. So glad you're liking Emily.), Ashmerlin (hello!), Taylor9901 (more on Victoria, coming up...), silkyjacob (hello again...thanks!), and all the guest/anonymous commenters.

As Elvis would say, Thank you. Thank you very much.

Now enjoy this new stuff. A rather long chapter. Might take 30 min. to read it. Stock up on snacks. 3, 2, 1, GO.

* * *

 **Chapter Ten**

 **"Mirror, Mirror, on the Wall, Who is the Wolfiest One of All?"**

* * *

 _Well, shit,_ thought Bella. _Now what?_

Sam's pickup truck was really nice. It had heated leather seats. It had a five disc CD player, a back-up camera, a lower gear option for heavy towing, and adjustable lumbar support. It also had a freezing cold, open truck bed, which was where Bella was riding home after her harrowing afternoon in the woods. Emily sat beside her. There was one small blanket, which Sam had offered to Emily so she could spread it on the seat and sit in the cab with him, but in a show of mud-covered solidarity, Emily chose to freeze in the truck bed with Bella. Sam set his jaw and climbed into the driver's seat.

As they sat with their backs against the cab, Emily put an arm around Bella. "Thank you for trying to save me."

Bella nodded, replaying Jacob's words in her mind: _You were so brave._ No one had ever said _that_ to her before. Usually it was, You are so clumsy, or, You are so quiet.

This was the second time in four days that Bella was going home covered in an appalling amount of filth. River water, swamp water, swamp mud, forest mud, sweat, wood smoke, and grass stains decorated her clothing, and her hair was tangled with hemlock needles. They were different from other evergreen tree needles because they were smaller, flatter, and thinner, making them harder to get out of her hair. She and Emily groomed one another—sort of like monkeys, thought Bella—as Sam drove them back to La Push through a maze of abandoned logging roads. The meadow hadn't been very far from one of them, so Sam had returned to La Push on four feet and returned to the meadow on four wheels.

"What are you doing after school tomorrow?" said the older girl.

"Working."

"When?"

"Probably three till seven."

"Can you reschedule?"

There was, Bella learned, a high probability of a pack meeting tomorrow afternoon. Emily spent the whole ride back to La Push explaining the concept of the pack, its hierarchy, its obligations, its expectations, its all-consuming importance that trumped everything else in one's life.

"But I'm not in the pack. And I have to work," said Bella. "I already rescheduled today's shift for tomorrow, so I have to—"

"Reschedule."

 _Shit._

By the time they got back to town, Bella learned that she was at least a pack satellite, if not a pack member. The pack was like the mob. The pack was like Sweet Valley High or The Babysitters' Club. The pack was like the Magic Treehouse and the National Guard and the CIA. The pack was like a frat house where everybody could read everybody else's thoughts—she didn't exactly understand that part—and a band of blood brothers— _literally,_ for they all shared some ancient, recessive gene that was triggered in times of danger—and a posse of underfunded vigilantes.

The pack was like a coven.

"I'm not so sure I want to be—"

"Too late," said Emily. "Be at our house by four o'clock. And bring some cookies; that'll make people hate you less."

"What?"

The pack existed because of the Cullens.

"Oh."

"But trying to save me and Quil will probably win you some points." The older girl's eyes were dark and serious. "You can't participate halfway. You have to go all in if you're going to be in, and congratulations, you're in. The boys need help. Please help me help them because _I_ need some help. Kim is only fourteen. She's— Well, she's fourteen. I need help."

Bella looked at her scarred face and thought about how she had said, _Stand_ up, _Bella_ in the meadow. Meet your death like an adult. She wasn't so sure she wanted to be in the service of Sam's gang‚—the pack, she reminded herself—but for Jacob, for Emily, for Quil and Embry, she said she'd give it a try.

"There is no try," said Emily. "Only do or do not." She put her hands on the sides of her head and held them out horizontally, like Yoda's ears, frowning solemnly. Then she snorted with laughter. Then she clutched Bella's wrist and said, "Please help me. They eat so much. They can't sleep well. Some of them can't wake up well. They stink. They swim in the river and drip on the floor. I do three or four loads of laundry every day because their families aren't supposed to know. Even Sam's family doesn't know. And Allison and Clara think I'm nuts. Maybe I am." Her eyes were very big. "Help me, _please."_

Okay, said Bella. Give me some laundry. I'll wash it tonight.

When they got back to La Push, Bella drove her truck from Jake's house to Sam's. Emily filled the truck bed with laundry. "Wait a minute—" said Bella and Sam at the same time. "She's helping me," growled Emily, pushing an enormous armful of dirty clothes over the lip of the truck bed. Bella looked hopefully to Sam to moderate the amount of "helping" she had gotten herself into, but it turned out that Sam's "wait a minute" meant that the laundry in the truck bed might blow away when she drove home. "Oh," said Emily. "Of course." Then Sam and Emily stuffed the passenger side of her cab with the laundry and sent her on her way.

"Sam likes his underwear folded twice!" hollered Emily as she pulled out of the drive.

 _Damn it._ _Why did I offer to help with the_ laundry _of all things?_ Now she was in possession of five guys' _underwear._ How was she going to explain this to Charlie? Or prevent his noticing? The laundry smelled like sweat and animal musk. _Sam can fold his own damn underwear._

The Clearwaters' brown Suburban was parked in the driveway when Bella got home.

Excellent, she thought. Maybe Charlie's friends would distract him. She pulled in beside it, close to the backdoor, and used Paul's T-shirt to rub the mud off her truck seat where she'd been sitting. She chose it because it was Paul's, and she knew it was his because someone, presumably Emily, had written the boys' names with a permanent marker on every single item. Then she carried an armful to the back porch and flopped it on the floor. There were some clean flannel pajamas in the laundry room, so she peeled off her own dirty things and dressed in those. Then she squished as many clothes as she thought was safe into the washer, added extra detergent, and turned the dial to "Heavily Soiled."

"Everything okay back there, Bella?" called Charlie from the kitchen.

"Yes." _No. I'm in possession of five guys' underwear._ "Everything's fine."

Sue and Harry were at the kitchen table, having dinner with Charlie. "What the hell happened to you?" they said when she came in.

Though she had changed into the clean pajamas, her hair and face were still a mess. "I found Jacob," she said with a frown. "He was in the woods." Ignoring their questioning looks, she went upstairs to shower.

The water that poured off her body and rolled down the drain was tinged brown with mud. She washed all over and let the warm water pound on her back as she tried to understand all that had happened that day.

First, Jacob was a wolf. He was a vampire-fighting supernatural being. She wanted him to be his regular self. But the presence of the Cullens—and Laurent—had triggered the magical gene. Jacob was forced or drafted into a responsibility that required the risk of his _life,_ but she knew he would never turn away from it. Her heart ached for him. He had been afraid that she'd hate him if she knew the truth. Well, of course not! But that street went both ways, and she was so thankful that he didn't hate _her_ for what had happened to him.

However, Emily had insinuated that the other wolves—people, she told herself— _did_ blame her for her association with vampires. _Bring some cookies,_ she had said; _that'll make people hate you less._ Well, wasn't that just great? She felt vaguely guilty, but also angry. It wasn't her fault that the Cullens were the world's worst allergen.

Next, she had to understand that the wolves—the people—were part of a pack whose importance outranked everything else in life: family, friends, food, sleep, school, clothes, the comfort of one's own bed, ordinary fun and relaxation, and the extraordinary cost of one's life. She couldn't expect Jacob to talk on the phone, visit her, have dates, or just hang out whenever they felt like it. His priorities were now fighting vampires, fighting vampires, fighting vampires, fighting vampires, fighting vampires, food and sleep (so he could fight vampires), school (so he wouldn't be marked truant and be forced to attend summer school instead of fight vampires), and nice things. Nice things like spending time with a girlfriend. Bella leaned her forehead on the wall of the shower and thought that this just wasn't _fair_.

Lastly, she had to promise to keep the existence of the wolves a secret. This would be hard. Keeping the Cullens' secret had been easy because she hadn't had anyone else to talk to, but now she was closer to Charlie, and she had friends like Leah, Angela, and Mike who would notice and be hurt if she dropped them for another obsession. She could recognize now how she must have looked to other people, talking only to the Cullens for months and months. This was going to be _really_ hard. Also, it was connected to Charlie's investigation, and he was trusting her, sharing stuff with her. Tears came to her eyes at the thought of damaging her fragile new relationship with him, but she'd have to make that sacrifice because it meant keeping the wolves—people—out of jail or a government science experiment. She allowed herself to sniffle a little until the water began to run cold; then she dried off, dressed, and returned to the kitchen.

Charlie and the Clearwaters were talking about Joy Ateara.

"That's just how she is, Charlie," said Sue. "It is _not_ her best quality. You know that."

"But I think I—"

"Yep," said Harry. "Totally messed it up."

Bella helped herself to rice and a vegetable stir fry Charlie had concocted from odds and ends. "Where's the meat?" he said as she sat down. "We had a freezer full of meat." Bella shrugged as if she didn't know, and Charlie glared at her in a way that said he'd be asking again when their company left. She took a seat at the far end of the table, hoping to eat quickly and avoid conversation.

"What have you done that's special for Joy?" asked Sue.

"We went to the movies."

"And?"

"And Malone's. In Port Angeles."

Sue and Harry looked at Charlie with a pitying expression. Bella gathered that they had already hashed over the special things Joy had done: two fancy dinners in her home with food that took hours to prepare, and agreeably accompanying him, despite the fact that it ruined their date, to buy gas in Forks when Bella's truck ran dry. Bella almost pointed out that Charlie had bought Joy a blue slushie at the gas station, but she figured this would not impress Sue.

"Well, no wonder she asked if you were embarrassed about her," said Sue.

"She was talking about sex in front of the kids."

"The kids are not interested in that. Are you, Bella?"

" _No."_

"Look," continued Sue, stone-faced, "you snuck around when you were seventeen, you clam up when she wants to talk about your relationship in front of your families, and you've publicly exposed your relationship to people in Port Angeles who don't know you. And everybody in La Push knows you're seeing her, but they're not seeing you."

"I've been kind of busy," he said defensively.

"You asked for our advice. You need to celebrate your relationship. Do special things for her. Show her you're not an embarrassed teenager stuck in a man's body."

"Ouch," said Bella. She couldn't help it.

"To be fair," said Harry, "she did pin him with that question in front of the kids."

Sue excused that as "because of the baggage." Every person, she said, no matter how sane or content, has baggage. Joy and Charlie have baggage because they snuck around twenty-odd years ago. Their relationship relied on dishonesty and secrecy because of their parents, and Joy was a mess because of Josh Uley, and even if Charlie had assuaged her pain now and then, she still was _in pain_ a lot of the time. Now she was trying to be different. To be cheerful. And now Charlie had to prove that his mindset was different, too. Clearly, Joy wanted him to be open.

"I'm not an open person," he argued. "I'm just not."

"Then you're a lonely person," said Harry.

Charlie mumbled something profane and stared at his half-empty plate.

"Just tell him the rule, Harry," sighed Sue.

"The rule is that Sue is always right."

"Because?" she prompted.

"Because she is the woman." Harry rolled his eyes as he recited what seemed to be a speech he was frequently expected to deliver. "The woman is always right because the woman is the soft, tender flower who deserves the best. Listening, understanding, respecting. Respect the feelings. Learn to recognize the feelings and respect them."

"And?" said Sue.

"And apologize."

The stony expression vanished from Sue's face as she nuzzled Harry under the chin and kissed his lips and cheeks. She scooted her chair closer, slipped her arm under Harry's, and lay her head on his shoulder. Bella had to remind herself to keep her expression neutral. She had never seen Sue acting so... cuddly. It was like seeing Leah wish on a star or hug a bunny, if Leah would ever consent to letting someone witness such things without punching them in the face.

Harry said, "This is how you make it last. You listen and apologize. Even if she runs you over with her car, you apologize for being in the road."

Charlie's eyebrows quirked upward in an expression of hopeless confusion. He looked—Bella was pained to recognize this—he looked like his heart hurt. Like he had lost something really important to him. If he and Joy got back together, she thought, would she have to listen to any more talks about _sex_? There ought to be a law against that, she thought. Sex talk + presence of offspring = NO. It conjured _horrible_ images that required a lot of effort to ignore. If they got back together, how much time would she—and Quil—have to spend with their fingers metaphorically in their ears and their eyes squeezed shut, thinking, _la, la, la, la, laaa! This is not happening!_ It was—she realized this with a feeling like her guts had just dropped out of her body—it was the reason why she chose to move away from Renee and Phil. They were loud. She used to lay awake with tears rolling down her face and her fingers not metaphorically in her ears. And if that happened with Charlie, where was she going to go?

She put her fork down and her elbows on the table, shoving her hands through her hair and staring at her dinner. Sue and Harry were talking about Joy and what she'd gone through after her husband had drowned. "I know," said Charlie, but Sue said fiercely, "No. You don't." The only person who knew was maybe Tiffany Call, who was silent as the grave. Tiffany Call was like La Push's well of stones; people dropped their secrets into her and knew they'd never see the light of day. As far as most people were concerned, Joy was fine. More than fine. She was a successful woman with a respectable job in PA. She could talk and talk about teens and sex ed, about weird symptoms of infections and gastrointestinal distress, about how to carve up a turkey or a salmon and what to do with its entrails, about crud caught in a bathtub drain, all kinds of stuff that made most people cringe, but she did _not_ talk about Big Quil. The fact that she had invited Charlie into her home and _kissed_ him was a big deal.

Charlie's face flushed pink.

Moreover, said Sue, she had become the subject of gossip, dating a friend of her late husband, a friend who hadn't taken her anywhere in La Push to show her friends his good intentions.

"Why is this a requirement?" demanded Charlie.

"Because it's a very small town, and everybody loves her." To Bella's surprise, Sue had tears in her eyes.

"I'm not going to hurt her," said Charlie quietly.

"I'm not sure she knows that."

Now it was Charlie's turn to put his elbows on the table, his hands in his hair, and stare at his plate. And Bella stared at him. It had never once occurred to her that _Joy_ might be the one whose heart needed protecting. It hadn't occurred to her, either, how very miserable her father would be without her. _Damn it._ Now _she_ was going to tear up. She could hardly believe she was saying this, but she pushed past her insecurity— _You were so brave_ — and muttered, "You should call her."

"Of course," said Sue, like it hadn't cost Bella a month of her life to say that. "That's what we've been saying."

"But you don't want me to date her," said Charlie flatly to his daughter.

Looking at the table, she mumbled, "I don't want you to be unhappy."

"Awwww!" said Sue, patting her knee. "Good girl." Bella squirmed away. "Aw, look at that, Charlie; she's so much like you."

"Okay, fine," sighed Charlie. "I'll call her. I'll apologize." His confusion and hurt were turning toward stoic resolution. "I'll apologize for making her think I was embarrassed. For saying 'yes' when she asked, even though I meant talking about sex in front of the kids."

"Gross," muttered Bella.

"And then _she_ will apologize for—"

"So close," said Harry. "But not how it works."

Charlie sighed again at the injustice of it all.

"It's not 1984 anymore," said Harry. "Men are supposed to be smarter and more sensitive."

"He's sensitive," said Bella.

"Sensitive and strong enough to apologize. Come on, role play with me."

"No," said Charlie, with a look of disgust. "That's—"

"Oh, Charlie," said Harry in a funny voice. "I borrowed your razor, and now it's all dull and rusty."

Charlie stared at him. Sue looked like she wanted to laugh. Harry looked at Bella, and suddenly she understood this game. She rolled her eyes and said in a deep voice, "Golly, Joy. Sorry my razor was such low quality."

Harry's eyes were twinkling.

"I hope your legs aren't nicked up," Bella continued in her dopey voice. "I was thinking about growing a beard anyway."

Charlie frowned at her as Sue snickered with the back of her hand against her nose.

"But Charlie," continued Harry in his funny voice, "I don't like you with a beard. It's too scratchy on my—"

"Whoa, whoa, whoa," interrupted Bella, almost forgetting to use her man voice. "If you don't like beards, I'm so sorry I thought of that."

"I can't believe you didn't remember that I don't like beards," squeaked Harry. "I told you that twenty years ago, and now you've forgotten. You must not think of me very often."

Charlie got into the game, but only as an umpire: "Now that's just unreasonable."

"And you think my feelings are 'unreasonable?'" said Harry, putting his hand over his heart about six inches _away_ from his chest, as if placing his hand over a full-figured bosom. "How long have you been thinking that, eh?"

"Oh, my God," groaned Charlie, "that's—"

"Golly, Joy," said Bella again in her man voice, "I'm sorry. All your feelings are very important to me. Your feelings are perfectly understandable considering what an ass I've been."

Harry gave her a high five.

"Okay, okay," said Charlie.

The washing machine gave a dull thunk at the end of its cycle, and Bella excused herself. On the enclosed back porch, she transferred the wet laundry to the dryer. Most of the dirt seemed to have come out, but there were still some stains. _Stains that are about to be set in because I am not scrubbing them out and rewashing this crud.._ She went out to her truck and hauled in more laundry, holding her breath, trying to carry as much as possible yet prevent it from touching her face. She stuffed another perilously full load into the washer, and when she turned around, Harry was waiting at the closed kitchen door.

"You found Jacob," he said.

She gave the briefest nod.

"Was he looking well?"

"He was looking about eight feet long."

Harry passed a hand over his unshaven face, looking more resigned than surprised. He mumbled something about the necessity for secrecy, which made her want to roll her eyes. Secrets on top of secrets.

"What's all this?" he continued. "Laundry?"

Yes, obviously, it was laundry. She felt a little irritated as he stooped to look in the dryer window at the swirling clothes, and more irritated when he stopped the machine and pulled out a white undershirt with a green smear on it.

"Most of these boys' families don't know. They can't know. So their clothes have to look normal." He got down on a knee and scooped out more wet clothes, saying, "Grass, grass, blood, ashes, blood, dirt. Mustard." Bella wilted as he put the pile of stained, wet slop on top of the machine and reached for the Fells Naptha soap on the shelf. "If you're in, you have to be all in." It sounded like what Emily had said. He scrubbed at a streak of dark, blackish _something_ on a pair of jeans. Reluctantly, Bella got a small brush and a bottle of color safe bleach. "Thank you," said Harry. "They need you."

"Emily says they hate me."

"Well, it's hard for them to understand your choices. Hard for me and Billy, frankly. And Old Quil. Forget it. It's best to just never talk about this with him."

"He knows?" This mystery, she thought, was like an octopus. She had found one tentacle, and now seven more plus a head with a snapping beak swirled toward her from a cloud of ink. "He _knows_?" she said indignantly. "Then why didn't he tell Quil?"

Harry's expression sank. "Today?"

"It was horrible."

Sue opened the door. "What's all this?"

"Science experiment," said Harry.

Sue looked at Bella.

"An experiment about stain removal. I'm, uh, making a graph about which kinds of soap work best on which kinds of stains."

"That's an awful lot of—" Sue started to say, but the phone rang and she turned back to the kitchen. Harry followed at her elbow, closing the door behind them.

 _Old Quil knew? How long? What had he known, exactly? Why hadn't he told Quil?_

Furiously, she scrubbed at the stains until she accidentally made a small hole in a shirt. Then she tossed the soap down with shaking hands. She'd have to come back when she wasn't angry enough to shred this whole pile. _Old Quil knew? And Billy knew? Had Billy given Jacob any warning? Or had Jacob learned about all this the way Quil had, with a bloody, painful, frightening change, far from home, in the presence of death?_ She didn't think she'd ever forget the sound of Quil's screams, the sound of his terror and agony. She could never forget the blood, such a lot of blood, dripping down the stems of the grass where he disappeared. Had that happened to Jacob?

She lifted the lid of the washing machine and rinsed her hands in the hot water pouring over the new load. In the kitchen, she dried her hands on a dishtowel and stood leaning against the counter with her arms crossed, in a mood so foul and black that the back of her throat stung with bile. Sue and Harry whispered goodbye to Charlie—he was still on the phone—and put on their coats. Bella followed them outside, and as Sue climbed into the driver's seat, she followed Harry around to the passenger side. Before he could open his door, she hissed, "What am I supposed to tell Charlie? Three loads of boys' laundry covered with God knows what? And what about Joy?" She could hardly believe she was advocating for Joy in any respect, but it seemed obvious that she might want to know—that she _deserved_ to know—what had happened to her only child. "Did Old Quil tell _her?"_

Harry whirled on her with a harshness she had never before seen on his gentle face. "You have _no room_ to criticize us. This is all on a need-to-know basis. You will keep quiet until further notice."

His anger made her feel like a defiant child. She had to fight the urge to say, _You're not the boss of me._

"You were not supposed to know. Only the boys and the Council."

Leaning across the cab, Sue rolled down the passenger side window. "Hurry up."

"You can tell Charlie anything you want," he said coldly. "Except the truth. You're good at that."

Bella stepped back, stung. As Sue backed out of the drive, she saw Harry fasten his seat belt and put his hand over his heart, closing his eyes.

* * *

Charlie was on the phone with Joy. He was saying things in a rush, things like, "No, _I'm_ sorry. No, it was _my_ fault," and "I'm so glad you called." Then there were some quieter words that Bella refused to hear as she took the stairs two at a time. She slipped on the last step and cracked her shin so hard it made her cry, and she sat at the top of the stairs, pulling her pajama pants leg up and curling over the spot that would probably be bruised for weeks.

How painful would it have been to listen to Charlie's mushy talk? _This_ painful? This was fricking painful.

"I'll be back in a couple hours," Charlie called, and then she was alone with her barking shin and an equally painful opportunity for self-reflection: _Sometimes I am a jerk._

* * *

She spent Monday attending school but pretending to be sick. It wasn't that hard. All she had to do was think about her aching shin, already swollen and purple, and the events of the past twenty-four hours. It was easy to let the shivers roll down her spine. Perhaps they would look like fever chills to Mike. He was the one she wanted to convince. In history class, last period, she lay her head on her desk and listened to Mrs. Kranz's lecture with her face turned toward Mike, her mouth slightly open and her eyelids fluttering.

"You want me to take your shift today?" he eventually said.

"No," she feigned. "I'm okay."

"My mom said you were sick yesterday."

Bella coughed weakly, then stopped. What illness was she trying to fake, exactly? Maybe the coughing was too much.

"You look really weird," said Mike. "Just go home. Sleep or something."

"Thank you," she sighed. When the bell rang, she had to make herself walk really slowly to the parking lot. Angela followed.

"You're not sick," she said quietly, putting a hand on Bella's truck door not to hold it shut but to intimate that she wasn't letting her get away with dishonesty. "What's wrong?"

Bella pressed her lips together and pushed her hands into the pocket of her red coat. Sue had returned it yesterday. "Jacob is having a problem," she said, which was true.

"Oh, no. You talked to him?"

"Yes. Finally. And he's— He's—" _He's having a huge problem. His body has broken and reformed._ The word broken seemed like another kernel of truth she could offer. "He's having a breakdown. Stress. He's seriously freaking out."

"He doesn't seem like the freakout type."

"He hides it well."

Angela pushed her hands into her own coat pockets, shivering, as the wind lifted her hair from her neck. "You can tell me, you know," she said quietly. "That's what friends do."

"I'm sorry." Bella looked at the pocked asphalt, stained with oil. "He has a secret, and he asked me not to say anything about it." That, too, was partly true.

"Well, I'm here. If you want."

Bella stopped herself from apologizing again because she thought it would make her sound as guilty as she felt. "I'd tell you if I could," was the best she could offer. Angela hugged her. _Hugged her_ , even though Bella had lied to her and put her off. That, too, was what friends do, she realized.

She hugged her back and went home to get the boys' laundry. That had taken hours last night. She had done her homework at the kitchen table, getting up every fifteen minutes or so to check on the stuff she was bleaching in Charlie's utility sink and keep the dryer moving so the clothes wouldn't crumple and wrinkle. She had just barely finished packing the neatly folded clothes into three giant plastic trash bags and stowing them in her truck when she saw the headlights of Charlie's cruiser turn the corner at the end of the block. She scurried to her bedroom and lay on her side, pretending to be asleep. Charlie looked in on her, but didn't say anything. In the morning, she repeatedly hit snooze on her alarm clock and stared at the ceiling for nearly half an hour. Then she jumped up and frantically got dressed. Charlie tried to pull her into a conversation about Jacob, but she said she was late for school.

Now it was nearly four o'clock. She figured she wouldn't be able to evade him at dinner tonight, so hopefully this so-called pack meeting would release her from some of the secrecy. Surely immediate family members should know. Bella rolled her shoulders as she drove west on the 110 spur to La Push. Yes, she thought. She would go into that meeting and talk some sense into those people. Joy needed to know. Charlie needed to know. Old Quil needed to know how scared his grandson had been. Sam needed to know how long it had taken her to do all that laundry, and those boys needed to know that they should be more careful with their clothes.

 _I'm good at organizing things,_ she thought. Emily said they needed help, and lucky for them, here she was. _At least I can get them to organize their stupid laundry._ As she passed the reservation boundary, she was frowning with a mixture of irritation and indignation. But when she passed the general store, she remembered that most of these guys hated her and that she was supposed to have baked conciliatory cookies. She turned around in the campground parking lot, bought a package of Oreos—which made her worry about Riley—and drove to Sam's house. The tunnel-like road through the trees was so dim in the late afternoon that it seemed prudent to turn on her headlights.

Ellen Uley answered her knock at the door. She was not quite five feet tall, Bella noticed, since she herself was barely five foot, four. Ellen Uley squinted up at her, changed her expression to one of disgust, said, "They're in the woods," and shut the door.

Bella's indignation returned as she went back to her truck and slung the handles of the three enormous plastic bags over her shoulder. It was almost impossible to walk under the weight of the laundry. She paused to put the package of cookies into a bag and slowly, slowly, crept around the side of the house. Sam's backyard, with its lush and evenly mown grass, was mostly free of sticks, so she set the bags down and dragged them toward the woods. But even with the slick, damp grass, moving them was so difficult that she had to walk backward. She imagined herself as an overworked farmer, pulling three recalcitrant black cows. It made her sweat and the straps hurt her hands. How big was his yard? An acre? Two? Why did he have to mow all this? Couldn't he have left part of it alone? Then the woods would have been closer to the house. She sat on one of the bags to rest. Looking back at Sam's house, she saw a curtain move and a small round face appear just above the windowsill. Claire. Her black hair was cut above the shoulder; black bangs hung in her eyes. She stared blankly at Bella.

"What are you doing?" hissed Sam, striding from the trees. He picked up the three bags in one hand and grabbed her arm with the other, forcing her to trot beside him. A hundred yards or so into the woods, he shoved her into the center of the well-trampled clearing she had discovered with Quil. Emily was there. So was Jacob. Paul leaned against a tree, indolent and insolent, and Embry sat on a stone, his lips pressed together and his eyes on the ground. There was another girl Bella had never seen before, a younger girl with brown hair who looked about fourteen. She was chewing on the end of a braid. When she took a break from that, she nibbled on her fingernails.

Kim, thought Bella. Maybe she's Kim.

"Congratulations," sneered Paul. "You've failed Pack 101."

The thanks she'd been expecting for the laundry turned into a snarling, withering explanation of her failure. Dragging bags of laundry through the yard was the worst kind of idiocy because Sam's family could be looking out the window. What would they think? Sam's face was red. Too many questions, he said. _Every day,_ he snarled, he had to avoid or deflect questions. He had worked too hard for her to blow this in her first few minutes of Packhood.

 _Packhood?_ she wanted to say. _Is that a word?_

Sam growled about secrecy for several more minutes, leaving Bella stranded in the middle of their circle as the others stared at her, or at Sam, or at the ground. She was supposed to _help_ them; for example, she could make herself useful by dishing on some of the information she'd surely gained in the course of her unnatural relationship with their mortal enemies, some of whom were probably out in the forest right now endangering her friends, friends who put themselves in danger to help _her_ and the rest of Klallam-freaking-County; for example, maybe she could do _that_ instead of blowing the cover they worked so desperately to maintain. When he finally finished, she was fuming, confused, and hurt. Jacob held out his hand, grimacing at Sam, but couldn't say anything. Literally, he couldn't. He looked instead at Embry, who looked between Sam and Bella, both red-faced.

"You can't drag the laundry," Embry quietly translated.

Sam sat on a log next to Emily and steepled his fingers, placing them over his nose.

"And Quil says hi," murmured Embry.

Emily passed her a plastic shopping bag. It had been twisted into a tight, perfect rosette. Jacob unwound it for her and spread it on the log beside him; everyone was sitting on these crinkly little things to keep their backsides dry. Bella sat down and turned her face into Jacob's shoulder as he put an arm around her and stroked his palm up and down her back.

The meeting was called to order. Emily did this because she had read a pamphlet about parliamentary procedure in high school. It wasn't much, but it made her the most qualified, and like Bella, she had noticed the boys needed to organize themselves better. Sam was not always capable of this, especially when he hadn't slept or when Paul was feeling hostile toward him. Or toward Billy. Or Jacob. Or vampires. Or Embry. Or his teachers, his father, Old Quil, Harry, or Bella. Or the thoughts of Bella in Jacob's head. He felt this way most of the time. Sam had urged him to direct his anger toward inanimate objects, and last week he broke his knuckles against some exposed granite on one of the ridges in the mountains.

"First," said Emily timidly, "we have to talk about Quil."

Quil had adjusted to the transformation well. He was pleased to be reunited with his friends, and he enjoyed the rush of supernatural speed. He had even accepted the reality of vampires without going half-mad. But there were still the common problems of adjustment, namely, what to say to his mother, and how to phase back. Last night, Jacob had flat out _lied_ to Mrs. Ateara, saying that Quil was spending the night at his house. That went okay. But this morning, while at work in Port Angeles, his mother had received a call from the school, reporting Quil absent. Did he have a cold, the secretary wanted to know. Mrs. Ateara said yes. Then she left work early, drove an hour home, and beat on Billy's door, demanding that he return her son. I don't know what you mean, said Billy. I think you do, said Mrs. Ateara. I think you do.

"How did she know?" said Sam.

"She's not stupid," muttered Bella.

There were six wolves now, and Quil faced the same problem that all the others had faced, except for Jacob. In Jacob's house, finding a false yet plausible explanation for his new appearance, appetite, and absences fell not on the shoulders of the wolf, but on those of the parent. Jacob whispered this to her: what plausible explanation, he kept asking, could his father have had for _not_ warning him when it became clear that the change was unavoidable? "Were you scared?" she whispered. "Yes," he whispered, his forehead pressed to her temple. "I was so—"

Paul picked up a rock and hurled it at Jacob's head; Embry was able to intercept the missile but not the message.

"Grow the fuck up," said Paul.

"Quil," Emily reminded them.

It was decided that Old Quil should come up with a reason that Joy would believe.

"Excellent," said Sam. "Next item."

"No," said Emily. "Item One-B. Phasing back."

He sighed.

Paul's idea was to threaten and bite Quil until he did it. Or starve him. Embry looked at Sam with one eyebrow raised, and Jacob said that Quil just had to be talked through it. It was hard. It had taken him a few days to figure it out, and Sam, with no guidance his first time, ran feral in the woods for two weeks. You are such an ass, Paul, said Jacob. Worked for me, said Paul.

Paul, Bella gathered, had phased back after only two days because he was so hungry and exhausted that he wanted to fit through the door of his father's house to get to the fridge.

"Jared's chill," said Embry. "He can talk him through it."

Jared, whispered Jacob to Bella, was unnervingly at peace with his inner wolf. He would sit in clearings blinking slowly or roll over and let the sun warm his belly. Sometimes he talked to voices no one else could hear. Embry's Psych 101 book said this was called a psychosis. It made them uncomfortable. Was something wrong with his mind? Was he going to snap one day and shred them all?

"Resolved," said Emily. "Old Quil will handle Item One-A, and Jared will handle Item One-B."

Bella figured Jared must be with Quil now; they were the only wolves not present.

"Now we have to talk about the hikers' disappearance," said Emily. "Item Two is Riley Biers and his friend."

Feeling pleased with herself, Bella pulled a folded white piece of paper from her pocket. She had remembered how helpful Charlie thought her information about Riley's boots was, so she had printed out a photo from the Asolo website that showed the tread design. She passed it to Emily, who looked it over and said, "Appendage, Item Two." Then she passed it to the other pack members.

Sam acknowledged that this was helpful. Very helpful. It was necessary for the search, and Charlie hadn't shared this with him because thanks to Bella, he now knew there was "a fucking _vampire_ in the woods," Sam snarled," and Charlie didn't want Sam or Paul to go out there anymore.

Unfortunately for Bella, Item Two was tabled in favor of Item Three, which was her indiscretion.

"Did you _tell_ him?" Sam demanded. "Did you just say, 'Hey, Dad, I dated a vampire. There's a vampire in the woods right now, eating hikers?'"

"No," said Bella.

"So you can keep this secret for the _Cullens_ —" he practically spat the name "—but you can't keep it for us?"

"I didn't know," she protested. "I didn't know about you all. And I didn't tell him about vampires; he read it in my notebook."

"You wrote it _down?_ " All the boys, even Jacob, looked at her like she was mad.

Item Three took up a lot of floor time. Bella sat beside Jacob with her face burning while Sam and Paul tore into her about this. They demanded to know how much Charlie knew about the wolves, and she admitted that she had told him there was a giant wolf in the woods, but that was only because she had thought it was a monster who might hurt Jake.

"So he knows about us, too?" All the boys seemed appalled.

"It was a _monster_ that was eating Jake!" she snarled. "He doesn't _really_ know about you. All of you."

Sam pressed the heel of his hand to his forehead, gazing bleakly at the ground. "He's gonna figure it out. We are so fucked."

"Don't you trust him?" said Bella.

"We are alive because we trust no one," he replied, and Paul laughed. The edges of his body blurred, and Sam said, "No... No, no, no, no... NO!"

"Come on, Paul," said Embry.

Clenching his teeth, Paul drew a sharp fingernail over his bare forearm until blood came, then he sucked on his arm while staring at Bella. "Inanimate objects, Paul," Sam reminded him.

"Something is wrong with him," Jacob whispered.

"Heard that," said Paul, lifting his head, leering at Bella with teeth edged in red.

"Hikers," said Emily. Her voice was quiet, her gaze flickering uncertainly around the clearing. The afternoon was fading to twilight. Beyond the clearing, the trees were cloaked in shadow. Bella began to feel uneasy. Obviously, something was wrong with Paul. The shadows, creeping closer as the meeting wore on, reminded her that she was in an ancient forest with a bunch of ancient magic, manifest in these boys who were adjusting to it with varying degrees of success.

"Hikers," said Emily again, more firmly. Bella offered what she could about Riley's appearance and the way he had described the girl he met online. "She speaks French. She has red hair."

"Oh, no," said Embry. The wolves all looked at the ground. At last Jacob whispered that her friend Riley was probably dead.

Bella felt numb. Jacob put his arm around her and she lay her face on his chest, her mouth slightly open, staring at the ferns that grew beside the log. Their green fronds seemed so delicate. Fragile. They uncurled softly with the new growth of spring. And just like that, Riley was gone. He was—he _had been_ she thought—smart and funny and interested in helping kids. He liked the outdoors. He had gotten his heart broken last winter, and he was trying to meet someone new. But that someone—

"Why do you think he's dead?" she asked dully.

"The red-head is a vampire."

A chill ran down her spine. _Victoria._ It had to be her. She had wanted Riley to show her the trails around Forks. Maybe she had been in the woods for weeks, looking for a way to get past the wolves, feeding occasionally on the unfortunate and solitary hiker, all the while trying to get to town. To get to _her._

She closed her eyes and listened to Jacob's heartbeat.

All the boys were looking at her, waiting for her response.

"You know something," said Jacob quietly.

Yes. Yes, she did.

She tried not to cry in front of them all. Staring at the ferns, she described what had happened last spring with James, Laurent, and Victoria. What had happened in Phoenix. How James had tricked her and bit her. How the Cullens had burned him. How Edward struggled to keep her from changing, and to keep himself from draining her. The scar on her hand. Jacob ran his fingers over it, and she felt him shudder. The more she talked, the more he trembled. Sam had to interrupt her more than once to command Jacob to keep still.

"They mate for life," she finished. "Edward took hers, so she wants to take his."

This statement provoked a variety of reactions. Jacob squeezed her hard against his chest, so hard it hurt, but she was afraid to tell him to stop because he didn't seem to be himself. Paul said this cleared up a lot of questions they'd had for a long time; mainly why the vampire kept aiming for Forks and why she was so persistent. It explained what Bella was to the Cullen clan. He spit at her and Jake. Called her the leavings. Jacob was close to boiling over; something bad was almost happening, but she wasn't sure what that would be. Embry got up and smoothed his hands over Jacob's face and scalp. _Not true,_ he said. _Not true._ And Sam put his elbows on his knees, letting his hands dangle between them, and said, "What else?"

"What do you mean, 'What else'?" demanded Jacob. "She's not. The end."

"She's the mate." Paul suggested offering her up, a suggestion that made her pallid with fear. Could they really do that?

Sam had to come help Embry, keeping his hands on Jacob's shoulders. "Come away, Bella," whispered Emily.

"No." She put her arms around Jacob's middle. "I'm not the mate." It was hard to choke the words out, so deep was the stabbing pain in her gut. "I'm not anything to him."

"'They mate for life,'" Paul repeated, and it made her feel confused.

"He left me," she said. "I nearly went crazy."

"Because you love him," said Paul. "You love that _thing._ "

"Bella, come now," said Emily, holding out her hand.

Later, she would realize that the boys must have been having this conversation for months. This conversation about _her._ Was she or wasn't she the mate? Why would she be with him? How had she survived? Why did she keep going back? What were they doing in her room, night after night, when that thing scaled the wall of her house? The outside of the window frame was still reeking with an invisible mark of possession. Of particular interest to Paul was whether or not she had fucked him.

" _What?_ " she managed to say.

"Jake wants to know," he replied. "Why don't you tell him?"

"It doesn't matter," ground out Jacob.

"Oh, I think it does," said Paul. "Can they cum? How does it feel, on the inside? How did he not break you?"

"That's enough, Paul," growled Sam.

"Jake wants to know. It's driving him crazy. He wants to get his tongue on your—"

"Stop!" snarled Jacob.

"Wants to claim your—"

A lot of things happened at once after that. Paul took a step toward her, Jacob shoved her aside, and she slid off the log backward. Simultaneously, she heard a horrible sound, a roar and a _wump,_ like a change in air pressure, and a red monster tumbled into the trees with his teeth on the neck of a gray wolf. Shreds of clothing fluttered over the clearing and a bit of blood dribbled off the log. The wolves rolled deeper into the forest, branches snapping, roaring so loud that she clapped her hands over her ears and screamed. She screamed from fright; she screamed because Emily was screaming about phasing too close; she screamed because Sam had dashed after them with another thunder-crack of air and a little spray of red on the new, spring maple leaves. Only Embry and Kim sat still, the girl looking petrified, the boy looking at Bella. Her face burned as she realized that Paul was talking about her _virginity,_ and that Jake had— "Does he really think about that?" she said, tears coming to her eyes, and Embry blushed and looked away.

"Jacob!" she screamed. After losing Riley and learning that Victoria was after her, she couldn't handle anything more. "How could you think that?" she screamed, crying now, as the extent of the pack mind dawned upon her. "How could you think that with these other people?" She started to go after them, picking up a rock like Paul had done, but Emily grabbed her arm and pulled her away. There were tears in her eyes, too.

"They can't help it," she said.

Seeing Emily's tears made Bella angrier. "How could you think that about _her_?" she roared. "That is private! What's wrong with you people?"

Kim started to cry, too. Bella stared at her. Wasn't she only fourteen? Bella didn't want to be judgemental or anything; many fourteen-year-olds were very mature; but Kim just looked so _young_ for her age; she looked so _young_ in the expression on her face, in the way she wore her hair in two little braids. In the way she wrapped her arms around her knees and squeezed her eyes shut. She was wearing tight jeans and a berry pink raincoat. Her tan face flushed darker, and a tear spilled down her cheek.

"Come on, Kim," said Embry. "He tries. Sometimes. Not to think about it."

" _Sometimes?_ " sobbed Kim.

Embry slid off his rock in a silver blur, like liquid mercury, his clothes slipping to the moss, and rose again as a wolf, trotting into the forest.

"Let's go," said Bella. She pulled the package of Oreos from one of the bags of laundry and started back toward Sam's house. The other girls followed. As she walked, Bella picked up a long, sturdy stick and thwacked everything she passed, trees, logs, rocks, bushes, and leaves, which fell from their branches in torn, tender green ribbons.

* * *

"Boys will be boys," said Ellen Uley, her bowie knife in hand, whittling fat chips off a small log near the fireplace. Bella thought she was trying to send some of them into the fire; when one flew in there every now and then, she looked almost pleased. When the girls came in, she took one look at their faces and said, "Boys will be boys." It made Bella angry. It sounded like something people say when they are tacitly giving boys permission to be idiots or pigs or both, without holding them accountable for at least _trying_ to improve themselves.

"Did you have a fight?" said Ellen.

"No," muttered Emily. She put the Oreos on a plate, fussing with them, arranging them in the shape of a flower while directing Bella to pour five little glasses of milk.

"I don't want any milk," said Ellen when Bella brought her a glass. "Juice of cow. No."

Bella tried to pour it back in the container, but a bit of it spilled down the side.

"Wasteful," said Ellen.

Looking for backup, Bella turned to Emily, but Emily just kept her head down and put the cookies and remaining four glasses on the table. "Claire," she called, and the little girl came out of a bedroom down the hall. "Hate you!" she said when she saw Bella, and she started to cry.

"No," sighed Emily, going to pick her up. "No, no, no. Too many tears today. Bella is very sorry, honey."

"Yes," said Bella, cringing at the memory of the fatal kick she had given Claire's pet baby skunk. "Very sorry."

"Hate you," repeated Claire. She turned her head into Emily's shoulder as Emily hoisted her onto one hip and carried her to the table, where she allowed the little girl to sit on her lap. Claire squirmed to get down until she saw the Oreos. Hesitantly, Bella offered her a cookie. "Look," she said quietly, turning the cookie sideways. "It's stripey." Claire's little eyebrows sank low over her eyes, pinched together. When she turned her face into Emily's shoulder again, Emily offered her a different cookie. Sam's mother and grandmother were not at home. His great-grandmother kept whittling, watching this scene out of the corner of her eye.

"How do you stand it?" said Bella.

Emily shrugged bleakly. "There's no choice, so you just have to stand it."

Twisting an Oreo apart and dragging her front teeth through the white filling, Kim said, "Jared says we'd be married by now if this was five hundred years ago."

"But it's 2006. Would you _want_ to be married now?"

"I don't know."

"But you should _know._ Don't you think you should know what you want?"

"There's not a choice," Emily snapped. "We're supposed to be together. It's like destiny or something. It's very powerful, and you can't fight it because you don't want to. We get nervous when we're not around each other. How do you think _this_ happened?" she snarled, indicating her scars.

"That's from—"

"From Sam, yes. I said 'No, what about Leah?' and he just fell apart. Or burst apart."

Bella gasped. So did Ellen at the fire. "Oh!" she said.

The three girls at the table turned toward the old woman with big eyes. Emily recovered first, saying, "The bear. Sam was there when the bear attacked."

Stiffly, Ellen rose and shuffled to the table in her stocking feet, where she bent over Emily, laying her wrinkled cheek on the top of Emily's head. She spoke in a language Bella assumed was Quileute. Then she put kisses into her brown, calloused palms and pressed them over Emily's scars. Emily sat stiffly, looking uncertainly toward Bella while the old woman mumbled into her hair, sat in the chair beside her, and held her hand on her lap, patting it. "Bear," she said, gesturing with her other hand as if Emily should continue her story.

"The bear," said Emily slowly. "Right. Well, when the bear wants to be with you, then you want to be with it. Don't you feel this? Don't you feel sick without him?"

"No."

"No? But I thought—"

"No?" said Ellen sharply. She stood up and spoke to—or rather spoke _at_ —Bella with more words she couldn't understand. Coming closer, she put her hands on Bella's face and squished her flesh this way and that, pulling her lips back and looking critically at her teeth. "Stop it," said Bella. "What are you doing?" Ellen flapped a hand at her dismissively and shuffled down the hall. She reminded Bella of Mr. Horowitz.

"Maybe we should talk about this somewhere else," said Emily quietly. Then she put her face in her hands and said, "Oh, I'm so stupid. _Stupid._ "

"No," said Bella.

"Yes. I have one job. One job. Secrecy."

"You have lots of jobs," said Bella indignantly. "Laundry, laundry, laundry, putting up with their shit, and letting them see your personal business."

"Well, their job is worse!" she snapped.

Kim was looking at the table, chewing on her lower lip.

"I want to go home," said Bella. "My friend might be dead. Somebody wants to kill me. And I don't want Jake to think about— that kind of stuff with the others. This is horrible. We kissed one time! And now he's thinking—"

"They have a lot of urges!" said Emily. "They can't help it!"

"Shh," said Kim.

"And if we do that one day," said Bella, "I don't want everybody to see it!"

"Well, how do you think _I_ feel?" cried Emily. "And Kim? And I'm pretty sure Leah's in there, too; it's the kind of thing he would try not to think about, which means it's probably playing 24/7 in everybody's heads. And not just the first time; it's every time. We do it in the dark now so he'll only have a soundtrack to share!"

"Shh," said Kim, but Emily couldn't stop.

"You're worried about something that _might_ happen!" she cried.

"Oh, it's not gonna happen," growled Bella. "I don't want to have everybody looking at me like they know what my underwear looks like. And what does Paul mean with that word, "claim"? That is _not_ the right word to use; it's— Something is not right with—"

"They're very possessive. Like animals. Their brains are not working like normal; they want to growl and pee on everything."

"No, no, no!" said Bella. "I can't date somebody like that."

"Paul used the word, not Jake."

"Well, it's disgusting. Somebody's virgi— Somebody's personal— No one can "claim" that; it's not an object; it's an experience; it's—" A million thoughts were rushing through her head, including an image of stampeding pioneers on the Great Plains, galloping over the hills to be the first to drive a stake into the ground and "claim" a bunch of acres for a homestead. "I don't know how to explain it!" she concluded. "This is really messed up! This is some kind of sexist— objectifi—"

"Talk to Embry. He almost has the right words. Paul is his project. Emb bought a sociology textbook, and a psychology one, and something by Mary Stonemaker—"

"Wollstonecraft?"

"—her, and all these books are still not enough to define how— Well, Paul is an ass, okay?"

"No. This is not okay. Paul is in Jake's head. And I don't want to put up with his nasty comments about—"

"It's not nasty; it's normal," cried Emily. "Sex is not _bad!"_

"Paul is nasty. I hate him!" She was furious with herself for crying about this when Riley was gone, but she couldn't help it. "I wanted to hang out with Jacob; I wanted to sit with him and see movies and maybe make out on the porch again. I can't think about— You know what? I'm out."

"What?"

"I'm out. I want Jake out, too." She stood up and put her red wool coat on. There was a damp spot on the hem where Jake had knocked her onto the mossy ground. "Sam's the boss? Tell him Jake quits."

She turned away from the stricken look on Emily's face. In the driveway, she climbed into her old truck and savored the bang it made when she slammed the door. At least this rust bucket was good for expressing her feelings. But when she turned the key, nothing happened except for a stuttering, clicking noise. She turned the key again and again, then noticed that she'd left her headlights on, and therefore the battery was dead.

It was too much. The tall green trees seemed to loom over her oppressively. She closed her eyes, leaned her head on the steering wheel, and cried with her fist against her mouth to muffle the sound.

Riley was dead? She hoped the boys were wrong, but if Victoria was out there—if Victoria had tricked him— Oh, it was too awful to think about. And surely she was next. It was just a matter of time before Victoria slipped past the wolves.

Was it only two weeks ago that she and Jacob had kissed on her porch? It felt like forever. Now her relief and joy at finding him were extinguished in less than twenty-four hours. When she had dated Edward, she'd been curious about sex, and since Edward couldn't—or wouldn't—do it, his refusal ironically made her freer to daydream. She had thought about it a lot. But now she could hardly get her head around the possibility. She and Jacob had been friends for so long that it was hard to imagine anything more intimate than kissing. _Sex? With Jacob? Oh, my God, I don't know what to think about that._

Unfortunately, it sounded like Jake was thinking about it. And sharing those thoughts with others, albeit involuntarily. It felt violating. And it felt distancing. She and Jake were not feeling the same. It felt like she had just learned to ride a bicycle, and all the while he had been dying to get her into the cockpit of a 747.

 _Jake meets you where you are,_ said a little voice in the back of her head.

Well, yes, she thought, but she really hadn't wanted to know that he thought about sex. Suddenly, their relationship had become a lot more serious.

 _You're worried about something that MIGHT happen,_ Emily had said.

Nope. Not anymore. And then she realized what she was really crying about. It was the lost potential to have a normal relationship with Jake. One where their decisions could be made privately. She cried for herself, and she cried for Jake, and she cried for the rest of Sam's "pack." They must be miserable over this, too. Embry looked so uncomfortable. He and Quil were her friends, too. And oh, my God, now Embry and Quil had seen Jake imagining—

She cried for everybody except Paul. After ten minutes or so, she just sat staring dully at the trees on the other side of Sam's driveway, wishing her truck would start.

* * *

That night, Bella sat alone at Charlie's kitchen table, poking her fork at a braised chicken cutlet and some steamed broccoli over brown rice. She had made a nice dinner for herself and Charlie, but he wasn't home. He had telephoned, just as she was setting the table, to say that he was going to La Push to see Joy.

Joy was upset. She couldn't find Quil, and she suspected he had become wrapped up in the same shady business that had taken several teenage boys away from their families for a week or two and had given them back mysteriously changed. Was it drugs? A religious cult? Smuggling stuff? What on earth could that be? Were they exploiting laws about crimes that could and could not be prosecuted by non-tribal law enforcement? Maybe these young men were involved in a crime circuit. There were lines of black money stretching up and down the west coast, from San Diego to Seattle, in which stolen goods—from car break-ins, to home robberies, to workplace theft—were traded, transported, pawned, or sold in small, hard-to-trace batches. Could the boys be running with a gang like that?

Well, Bella had told Charlie there was a giant wolf in the woods. He didn't know that there were six of them, or that they were also those missing young men touched by magic. But Charlie, like Joy, wasn't stupid. For weeks, he had been reading anthropological texts on Olympic Peninsula tribes, absorbing their legends, histories, customs, artifacts and art forms. It wasn't as if those books were going to talk about a vampire-hunting wolf pack. But knowing about vampires was a primer for believing in magic... and the rest of it wasn't such a stretch. Bella had halfway solved the wolf mystery just by remembering the many wolf images seen in La Push, from decorations on the general store to the carvings on the cedar canoes. Charlie, she had to admit, was smarter than she. All he had to do was stop at the gas pump outside the general store and glance around while filling up the cruiser. Yep, Charlie wasn't stupid. Right now, he could be confronting Billy, Harry, or Old Quil about the disappearance of these boys.

Bella didn't feel like eating, but she made herself take a few bites of everything on her plate before wrapping up the leftovers and putting them in the refrigerator. She labored through her homework, all of which seemed pointless except for Mary Shelley's _Frankenstein,_ which she hoped fervently was entirely fictitious, and then she went upstairs to soak in the bathtub, staring at the tile with the same miserable torpidity she'd felt when Emily had come outside and tapped on her truck window after she'd been crying in the driveway for a while.

It was funny, she thought, adding more bubble soap to the water, how she could go on a long journey without ever leaving the driveway. Emily had come out and knocked on the door, and it turned out that her interlude of crying in the truck was not the end of her afternoon; it was just a pit stop on the highway of to hell that was her first day of packhood. There was not enough bubble bath in the world to make this go away.

"What?" Bella had said dully, still staring straight ahead.

Emily had opened the door and climbed into the passenger seat. "I'm sorry I yelled at you," she said quietly.

"I'm sorry, too," said Bella.

"I'm so ugly," said Emily.

"What?"

"I am." She said it as though it were an objective fact. "I'm glad of the imprint because no one else would love me."

Bella's mind was too exhausted to summon any more emotion. She only said, "The what?"

Emily explained the bond.

"That's—" began Bella, but she didn't know _what_ it was. That's weird? That's wonderful? That's awful? She didn't know. She put her head back on the steering wheel and said, "People would love you. You're like, made of love. You're patient and stuff."

"You don't know me that well yet."

Then, to Bella's horror, Emily burst into tears. "I need help. Please don't go."

Bella only closed her eyes.

"I cook dinner, I wash the clothes, I make the snacks, I crawl around in the woods finding their clothes before anyone else does. I lie to their moms. I lie to my mom. Their parents think we're doing something wrong or dangerous, and I'm like fucking Sacagawea, like, 'Ooh, there's a girl with those boys, so it can't be all bad.'"

"Sack of what?" Bella said dully.

"I was going to go to college. Now I'm using my savings to feed them."

"Make them chip in."

"They do! And— Shit, it's Kim.

Bella opened her eyes to see the younger girl coming down the porch steps, hugging her arms to her sides.

"Act normal," said Emily.

If she weren't emotionally exhausted, she might have thought that was funny. But she couldn't even summon the energy to roll her eyes as Kim opened the passenger door and squeezed inside. She was looking at Bella, who still had her forehead against the steering wheel but had shifted to face her. Kim's brown eyes were wide and staring.

"I think I'm too young to get married," she said dazedly.

Bella snorted.

"My mom hates Jared. She found a condom in the trash."

"Wrap them up," said Emily. "Or don't have sex at your house."

"Maybe I shouldn't get married."

Bella lifted her head and let it flop down again. The truck's horn gave a squawk. Get out of my truck, she wanted to say, but even that felt like too much effort. Then there was a tapping on the passenger door but no one visible through the window. Carefully, Kim opened the door, and Claire, snot smeared on her face, squirmed into the cab and onto Emily's lap.

"Why can't I go home?" she cried. "I want my mommy."

"Shh," said Emily. "Mommy is sick. I'm taking care of you. I'm taking good care of you."

"I want Mommy," wept the little girl.

Emily closed her eyes and rocked the girl back and forth, hugging her. Bella closed her eyes, too, wishing the girl would stop hiccuping and sniffling. _You want your mommy?_ she thought sourly. _Well, shut up. Maybe I do, too. Maybe I want my mommy to be normal, to give a shit about somebody beyond the end of her nose._ Then _that_ thought made her look at herself. It was like when she'd cracked her shin on the stairs trying to get out of earshot of Charlie and Joy's mushy phone call. _I am a jerk,_ she thought. _I am begrudging a three-year-old the right to cry about missing her mommy who is sick._ She sighed, her eyes still shut, and reached out a hand until she found Claire's shoulder and patted her awkwardly.

"Maybe we should take the baby, too," said Kim. "Maybe, like, babysit him long term."

"I can't do the baby, too, and she won't let go of him anyway," said Emily. "She's nursing."

"Your sister has a baby?" said Bella.

Emily nodded as Claire smeared her nose on Emily's shirt.

"We could at least watch him once a week or something," said Kim.

"Julie doesn't like to take him in the car."

"We could go _there_."

"Please stop. This is the best way. To take care of Claire."

Bella wondered what was wrong with Emily's sister.

"Maybe the baby could—" began Kim, but then she stared over the dashboard with a dazed expression again, saying, "What if _I_ had a baby?"

"Do _not_ have a baby," said Emily.

"Not on purpose," said Kim. "But what if accidentally—"

"No. No babies, no accidents. Aren't you and Jared being careful?"

"Mostly. But my mom found the condom, so I thought if there wasn't anything to find, it might be better."

"NO. It would _not_ be better." Emily turned to Bella with wide eyes, and Bella understood instantly that this was another of the jobs Emily needed help with.

"Don't have a baby, Kim," she said. "You might not be able to finish high school, and babies are expensive, and then you'd be stuck with a baby."

"And then your mom would _really_ hate Jared," said Emily fiercely. "Look, pulling out is not going to prevent babies. It's not good enough. There's these little sperm things that swim out beforehand—"

"Pre-seminal fluid," supplied Bella automatically, reciting what she'd learned in health class. Then she blushed and thought _Dear God, why are we talking about sex again? Why do I have a fourteen-year-old in my truck who wonders if her mom NOT finding a condom would be better than getting pregnant?_ Kim was protesting that she certainly wasn't _trying_ to get pregnant; she didn't _really_ want a baby; but maybe holding Julie's baby would help. Sometimes she felt these urges like Jared. Urges to see and smell and hold a baby.

" _What?!"_ said Bella. "Are you out of your mind?"

"We would be married!" said Kim. "And Julie needs help! She should just give us the baby and I'll stop feeling this way!"

"Oh, my God," groaned Emily.

"Or maybe I'm too young to get married," said Kim again, more quietly, and Bella said, " _Yes._ Stick with that thought."

The truck's door creaked open yet again, and Ellen Uley was there, pulling on Kim's elbow with her gnarled hand until Kim said, "Ouch!" and stumbled out of the cab. Then Ellen pulled on the seat, trying to get a grip on the cracked black vinyl with her nails, her nut-brown, wrinkled face reddening with the effort. Emily offered her a hand up, but she snarled that she could do it herself. And she did, after a couple minutes of scrabbling and straining. Bella thought she looked like an emaciated, scarred walrus trying to climb onto an ice floe, and then she felt vaguely ashamed. Ellen was probably at least ten years older than Vera, and she supposed she ought to respect that. When the old woman finally clawed her way onto the seat, she reached into the pocket of her enormous blue skirt and fished out a sticky, dusty little tin that looked like it was almost as old as she was. The label, if there ever had been one, had peeled off. "Open," said Ellen, shoving it into Bella's hands. As she twisted the lid, Bella tried not to wrinkle her nose at the way the grime came off on her hands. There was a yellowish goop inside, the color of book pages that are so old they crumble at the touch.

"Candy?" said Claire.

"No." Ellen scooped out a greasy handful and plopped it onto Emily's face. Emily said, "Gah!" and Ellen said, "Shut up. Sit still," and smeared it over Emily's face. So Emily held still, squeezing her eyes shut. The stuff smelled like gasoline and grass clippings, but Bella got the impression that when Ellen Uley said shut up and sit still, you kind of had to do it. When she had finished, the old woman extended her hands to Bella. Bella thought she wanted the lid, but instead Ellen wiped her hands clean on Bella's pants. When she was satisfied—either with the cleanliness of her hands or the sliminess of Bella's pants, Bella couldn't tell—Ellen stroked her hand over Claire's hair and spoke to her in the language that was almost dead.

Claire responded in the same tongue. It made Ellen look so, so proud, but it made Bella wonder how long that girl had been in Sam's house, missing her mommy. Claire wiped the back of her hand across her nose and tried to stop sniffling. Ellen murmured something else and nudged her to turn around.

"Okay," said Claire, in a very small voice, looking at Bella. There were still tears trembling in the corners of her eyes. "When?"

"Saturday," said Ellen, nudging her again.

"Thank you," said the girl.

Ellen murmured to her once more, and Claire ducked her head under Emily's chin and sighed, closing her eyes.

Bella had an uncomfortable suspicion that something involving herself had happened. "Um," she began, but then Ellen slid awkwardly out of the cab, and Bella and Emily had to look the other way so she could preserve her dignity. They looked away still longer as she scrabbled into the cab of _Sam's_ truck, parked on the other side of the driveway area, facing Bella's. "Oh, God, no, please, no," whispered Emily as they heard the powerful engine rumble to life and the big, black truck began to advance toward them. The tiny woman was so short that it looked like no one was driving. Just when Bella had braced herself for a front end, tortoise-speed collision, Sam's truck stopped a few inches from her front bumper.

It had been quite an afternoon.

Now, back at home and soaking in the bathtub, Bella reflected that it could have been worse. Not much worse, but still, it _could_ have been a _little_ bit worse. With a sigh, she slid beneath the warm water, letting her hair fan out. When she sat up again, the water dribbled down her shoulders and between her breasts. It had been quite an afternoon, and in her mind she tried to make a list of her new realities.

First, Riley might be dead and Victoria was coming to get her. She knew she'd begin shaking and crying if she thought about it too long, so she bit her lip and forced herself not to.

Second, Jacob thought about sex. She hadn't expected that. It made her feel awkward and uncertain. One thing _was_ certain, though: the fact that he was thinking about it with other people pretty much guaranteed they would never have it.

Third, Ellen Uley was a horrible, manipulative witch. A wrinkly old witch whom she supposed deserved respect for having reached her advanced age, but a witch never-the-less. She and Emily had jumped Bella's truck battery and sent her on her way. "I want to wait for Jake," Bella had protested, rolling down her window to say so, but Ellen banged the hood of her truck with a large, heavy stick, hollering, "What? I can't hear you!" Emily, Kim, and Claire didn't try to take away the stick. _Bang, bang, bang!_ "You're denting my truck!" Bella said, and Ellen said, "Oops! Am I?" She dropped the stick and found a ball-peen hammer on the floor of Sam's cab.

"Ellen," said Emily, "Maybe— Ah, it got in my eye! Oh, it stings!" and Bella's potential rescuer ran into the house, wiping the ointment on her face. Kim stood uselessly mute, holding Claire's hand, and Ellen resumed her work. _Ting! Ting!_ said the hammer. It couldn't inflict the kind of damage that a crow bar might—or Leah's crutch, thought Bella with a groan of contrition—but it was a precise instrument, and Ellen Uley was oddly strong for someone who was nearly a hundred years old. The hood began to resemble the asteroid-pocked surface of the moon. Bella had no choice but to turn her wheels toward the road.

It had been infuriating. She was forced to drive away very, very, _very_ slowly because Ellen kept circling the truck, hammering here and there and everywhere, now and then hobbling in front of it and saying things that nobody understood but Claire. Claire laughed. Bella felt insulted, but it was impossible to respond because A) she didn't speak Quileute, and B) she had to concentrate on driving so that she could both get away and not run over the old lady. In her rearview mirror, after Ellen had been bludgeoning one particular spot, Bella saw a rusty red hunk of her tailgate, a hunk about the size of a tea cup, crack off and disintegrate on the ground.

"Saturday?" said Claire, walking beside the truck, looking up at Bella.

"What?" said Bella. It was hard to hear over the banging and pinging of the hammer.

"Saturday?"

Ellen said, "Yes, honey, Saturday." _Ting!_ "Saturday is the day when Bella will get you a real kitten."

"How many days till then?" said Claire. "One? Is it one?"

"Wait a minute," Bella said, still creeping toward the road at approximately one mile per hour.

"Oh, that's a good idea," said Emily, coming down the porch steps, dabbing at her eye with a paper towel. "That's really sweet of you, Bella. I didn't know you thought of that."

"They cost fifty-five dollars a piece," said Ellen. _Ting! Ting, ting, ting!_ "I called the Humane Society in Port Angeles and I asked."

"Can I have a black and white one?" said Claire.

"You can have as many as you want," said Ellen.

"Yay!"

"Here, honey, here's a stick." Ellen gave Claire a toddler-sized weapon and told her that Bella's truck needed help to get to the road. The three-year-old thwacked the rear bumper obligingly, purposefully, shouting, "Go! Truck! Go!"

 _Fuck,_ thought Bella as she soaked in the bathtub. Downstairs, she heard Charlie come in through the backdoor, stamping his feet on the mat. "Did you have a car accident, Bella?" he hollered. "Was there a hailstorm? Are you okay?"

"Me?" said Bella. "Oh, I'm fine. Terrific."

She slid beneath the water again and exhaled. This day _could_ have been worse. At least it was only Jake's _imagination_ that had been shared. And at least she hadn't been manipulated into getting the girl a new skunk.

* * *

 **END OF CHAPTER**

* * *

Questions? Why, yes, please.

1\. What do you think of the pack meeting? Bella's attitude about helping? Bella getting scolded? Jacob not saying (or unable to say) very much? Paul's comments? Embry's efforts to analyze Paul? Embry's method of phasing? Is different okay? Or OOC?

2\. What do you think of B's reaction to sex and the packmind? How about Emily's attitude about it?

3\. Kim? Urges?

4\. Would you like to meet Emily's sister Julie, or should she remain a character who's just mentioned by the other characters?

5\. As far as Harry's advice to Charlie regarding his relationship with Joy, do you think it's okay to tell him that the woman is always right? Does that keep a relationship happy? Or is that just as sexist as Paul's comment about claiming? Does it reduce one (or both) of the partners in a relationship? Or is there no harm in that?

6\. Should Bella get Claire a kitten? Should Bella feel pissed at Ellen?

7\. Funny bits? Favorites? Things you agree or disagree with these characters about?

8\. Who is the wolfiest one of all? Why? Define wolfy/wolfish? Hunger? Ferocity? The urge to protect? Craftiness? Intelligence? Endurance? Courage? Risk-Taking? Stone-cold sane, or quite the opposite? Hmmm _… What are the qualities you think define a wolf, and who is the wolfiest one of all?_

Well! I think that I've actually written more questions than usual! You can pick and choose, mix and match. Do please share your thoughts. You know I love them and am thankful for your interest in my story. Thank you, thank you. I will TRY to send you all a preview of the next chapter, but I guess it's realistic for me to acknowledge that I might have to occasionally prioritize things like eating and sleeping and bathing my kids now and then. ;-) I'll do my best, but my kids are stinky. Love to all.

-AmandaForks


	11. I'd Like to Speak to the Management

Hello,

Thank you to all the wonderful readers who reviewed the last chapter. It was so cool to read your comments. There was a lot of discussion over the sexism of Harry and Sue's way of preserving marital harmony, with most of the commenters saying that it was sexist and demeaning in a way. One reader said that Bella and Harry's role playing conversation, as fun as it was, was still troubling because it was more than halfway serious. It was cool for me to read this because I grew up in a time when this was a good idea. Ha! Thank goodness relationships are moving beyond this. It was also cool to see your thoughts on grumbling, manipulative Ellen Uley. Lastly, I loved your comments about Kim and her thoughts about having a baby. Some readers posited that thoughts of babies might be part of the magic of imprinting. Babies and imprinting will come up again in future chapters.

Once again, many thanks to **KyleEverdeen** (I liked how you said you admire Emily for standing), **DistractionNation** (liked what you said about Bella and her support system), **echo58** (hello! Glad to see you), **MartaS** (so interesting what you said about the girls' stress. Yes, I will explore the boys' stress, too. Thanks for that suggestion and your detailed note!), **MelkiSihou** (I was so excited to read your detailed comments! Glad the allergen joke made you smile), **brandileigh2000** (loved your detailed note! Glad you liked the shout out to old fiction series), **AprilShowers82** (Always love to hear from you! Liked what you said about B & J being "a perfect match for each other's hearts"), **PoisonIvy533** (thanks for answering all the ?s. Happy that the chapter made you laugh), **pingou** (love your new profile picture! the heart is adorable. Thank you as always. I read your stuff over and over and was so happy to confer w you about ch. 11.), **silkyjacob** (you said you're not liking Emily too much in this story, but I'll endeavor to have her win your heart later), **Ariel-Scarlett** (wow! awesome review. Thank you for all your thoughts. I agree with you about the laundry.), **klarsen117** (hello! chapter 11 might address your comment), **reyhoon** (I hope you enjoy chapter 11 with your breakfast, too! And yeah, imprinting might be related to babies. Oh, dear.), **Amanthya** (loved your words: "one. one fur baby" and your comments about subplots; thx.), **Jane** (glad the maple leaves made you smile), **fawnnwaf** (Hello! I liked how you said Emily is the backbone of the pack), **Robert Sooalo** (thank you so, so much for your kind words. made me very happy to read them.), **MissPoisonedAddiction** (I love hearing from you! Liked your ideas of Bella at the cat shelter), **PastOneonta** (I gobbled up your review as always. Love your detailed, thoughtful comments. Liked what you said about how the pack is struggling. My imagination runs along similar lines.), **ezinmaful** (I agree w/ you re: pack's treatment of B. Her task: earn better treatment. Can she do it? And now I shall endeavor to bathe my kids.), **I wanna be Jacob's imprint** (wow! THANKS for all your reviews! You are a joy to behold, as a reader who addresses each chapter even though it's tempting to skip to the most recent one. I esp. loved your thoughts on Angela and Ben.) **LCB** (hi there! I liked how you noticed harsh Harry. More on that is to come…) **darkchilde** (glad you're still enjoying your chapter!), and all guest reviewers. THANK YOU.

* * *

 **Chapter Eleven**

 **"I'd Like to Speak to the Management"**

Early Tuesday morning. The sun was barely peeking over the mountains, and the wolves ran through the woods, miles apart yet intimately connected, running over gravel stream beds, through dew and fog, through late spring snow on the mountains, through the shadowy vales of ferns, over the sandy, deserted beach far north of La Push, and beside—but not _on,_ where paw prints might show—the deep woods hiking trails of Olympic National Park. They ran alone and they ran together, streamers of color in Jake's metaphor: black Sam, green Jared, pale blue Embry, pink Jacob, and purple Paul. They made room for another, an orange ribbon whipping in the breeze.

Quil, said Sam, settle down. Try to blend in.

The colors wove together and separated again.

I need to get back to school, said Jacob, or I'm going to miss a test this afternoon. Cold wind stung the tips of his ears and there was ice between his toe pads. In his mind, pencils were rolling off desks, a flood of yellow pencils, pouring onto a green tiled classroom floor.

Sam said, It's not your turn; it's Embry's.

Pale blue, like the early morning sky, barely visible through the clouds, and his voice: He can have my turn.

No, I don't want to take your turn, said Jacob.

I'll take his turn, said Paul. I want to smell some girls. You all smell like piss and dirt.

Piss. Dirt. Territory. Scent. Possession. And an image of Edward Cullen flared in Jake's mind, raising their collective hackles. Quil tripped in a hole and tumbled down an escarpment, gravel sliding under his paws and under his back, through the thick brown fur, making his skin itchy and dusty. I'm up! he said, bounding onto his feet, shaking himself. I'm up!

You're scared, said Paul.

Don't be scared, said Sam. We're faster than those things. Our teeth can bite through their stony skin. And you already helped kill that one in the meadow.

But they have venom, said Quil. What if they bite me?

You said Bite me, said Paul.

Pink and Blue growled at him. Concentrate.

What if they bite me? said Quil. They have fangs?

No, regular-looking teeth. See? Jacob imagined Edward Cullen showing his movie star smile.

Movie star? said Embry. You think he looks like a movie star? More like a game show host.

Venom, said Quil. He thought of a rattlesnake. Thought of himself barefoot in a desert filled with rattlesnakes. The rattlesnakes were moving, hissing, and he couldn't run because there were spiny cacti all around him.

I was in a play once, said Sam.

Pink and Blue growled at Purple before he could say something derogatory.

And the director said to everybody backstage, Don't be nervous, just imagine the audience naked.

Six wolves cringed and yowled at the image of Edward Cullen naked. The orange ribbon snapped and tangled as the brown wolf tripped again and rolled downhill. I'm up! he said a moment later.

You're not up; we can see you, said Jared.

I'm up _now_.

We can see your paws through your own eyes, stupid, and your paws are sticking up into the sky.

Look, I gotta show up for the test, said Jacob, and Emb hasn't been to school in four days. Why can't we both have a turn?

I'm thinking about dropping out anyway, said Embry. Maybe like a leave of absence. Maybe they'll let me do that for a semester.

A semester? said Purple, the color bleeding through their minds like blood from a fresh wound. And what about after that? You think we're going to rid the world of vampires in a semester?

Don't drop out, Emb, said Green. You're the smartest. You gotta show up and, like, represent. Represent for us.

My GPA is going to hell. If I take a semester off, maybe I can start over.

Sam should take Emb's shift, said Orange. Orange had his nose in the headwaters of the Hoh River.

I do, said Sam. I take all the shifts. I've already taken a year off. At this rate I'm going to have to reapply to get back into college. And get your nose out of the water; how can you smell anything with your nose in the water?

Quit complaining, said Jacob. We're not going to solve this in a semester or a year or ten years. We just have to keep going.

But the last pack, said Quil. They solved the problem and stopped phasing, right? They stopped and lived like normal people.

Most of them, said Green.

What?

My nose hurts, said Orange.

Because it's freezing, stupid.

No, I put it in the stream because my nose hurts. It's all stingy and stuff.

It is?

Yeah, like a sweet, nasty smell, like— Like Bella's stuff in my grandpa's shed...

Oh, shit, Quil, where are you? Where are you?

The wolves raced toward a mind that wasn't sure where it was. Uphill. Deep into the woods.

* * *

"The vampire has red hair," Bella said to Charlie at breakfast Tuesday morning. She didn't give a fu— er, a flying fig about keeping this secret. Sam hadn't said anything about it at the pack meeting yesterday, not exactly, and even if he had, Charlie already knew about vampires. She had thought about this for hours last night, and telling Charlie seemed like the right decision. He had been treating her almost like a partner, showing her his map, sharing the clues as he gained them, and people's lives were at stake. Telling Charlie was the right thing to do for the safety of the other cops who were looking for Riley in the woods.

Before coming downstairs to deliver this bombshell, Bella had dressed for school and given herself a pep talk. _Right thing to do. Right thing to do._ Now, with Charlie staring at her, putting his coffee mug aside, she fixed herself a bowl of cereal and congratulated herself on the steadiness of her hands. _Right thing._

"She has long, curly red hair and her name's Victoria," she said, sitting opposite him. "She was probably the one who talked to Riley on Facebook and went hiking with him. She wanted Riley to show her the trails around Forks."

Charlie was dressed in his uniform, his gold badge pinned over his chest. He assumed a bland expression and leaned back in his chair with his arms folded.

Bella took a spoonful of cereal and continued. "So you're only looking for one hiker. But if he went into the woods with _her_ , he's probably... You know." She could feel her face getting hot because she didn't want to say the word _dead_. "You should probably tell the Port Angeles sheriff to give up. Get his guys out of the woods before somebody else gets hurt."

"Hmm," said Charlie. He tipped his chair forward, letting the front legs tap the floor, and pushed his own bowl of cereal aside. He laced his fingers together, setting his hands on the table.

"And I guess you should also tell Riley's parents." Her words were quieter. Talking about Riley was the hard part. "I guess you should tell them—"

"Yes?"

Oh, this was hard. She had thought she could talk about this without becoming upset. "I think he's gone."

"I'm sorry," said Charlie. "I'm sorry for your friend, and for you losing your friend."

She stared into her bowl, no longer hungry. And she hadn't even mentioned the most frightening fact of all, the fact which she was actively trying to avoid thinking about: that Victoria was here, that Victoria needed more knowledge of the trails to Forks, because she was intent on killing her in revenge for what Edward had done to James. After a moment, she took a deep breath and stood up to get ready for school. Charlie watched her load her books into a canvas shopping bag.

"Where's your backpack?"

 _Crap._ Her backpack was in the woods, probably still full of the meat she'd taken from Charlie's freezer two days ago in an attempt to appease the wolf monster, to keep it from eating Jacob. Well, in a way, it had eaten Jacob.

"It's, uh. I forgot it. In La Push."

"And where's Quil?"

"In La Push?"

"You don't sound too sure."

Bella blinked at him.

"Bella, there's a vampire in the woods. Quil is missing. Joy is panicking, but his grandfather doesn't seem concerned. Now you tell me you know this vampire's _name_?"

Not for the first time, Bella had the feeling that Charlie was way ahead of her.

"It makes me wonder what else you know. So why is it," he continued, "that during all the time those Cullens or Culpeppers were here in the 1930s, there was only one animal—or vampire—attack, and Billy's grandfather was on the scene? Why is it that there have been four, maybe more attacks now, and Billy is not involved? Or doesn't _seem to be_ involved? Why are these boys going missing? Sam, Jake, Quil? Embry? A couple more, too, I think. Sam's friend we met when we burned your comforter; what's his name?"

"Jared?"

"Yeah, him. And probably Paul; something is not right about that kid. And why are the women worried and the old men tight-lipped?"

 _Oh, dear._ She didn't like the way Charlie was looking at her.

"Sam's girlfriend was attacked, yet she doesn't want to talk about it. Sam never mentioned it, in all the time we've been investigating this together. Hmm. Makes you wonder, doesn't it?"

She did not know what to say.

"Thank you, Bella. You go to La Push yesterday afternoon and come back with information about the vampire. You don't seem too worried about Quil. And my naturalist at the Park Service has identified wolf prints belonging to six individual animals. Six unnaturally overgrown animals. Prints on the trails. Prints in my yard. Prints around Billy's garage—"

"You found those?"

"Prints Sam and Paul have been anxious to cover up."

"I really should get to school..."

" _Vampires are real_ ," he recited, those three words of damning evidence from her journal.

"I might be late..."

"How long do you think it will take for them to tell me?"

Bella felt petrified, unsure how much he knew. Had he figured it all out? If he had, what would that mean for Jake and his friends?

Charlie ran a hand through his short, dark hair and looked out the window at the yard. The grass might need mowing soon. "Just go to school," he sighed. "Act normal."

* * *

Bella stepped into the gym that afternoon, dressed in her physical education uniform of green shorts and a white T-shirt, and stared at the triangles of ten white pins Coach Clapp had set up along one wall. Lanes were separated by folded blue tumbling mats to serve as bumpers. _Bowling?_ she thought. _Seriously?_

"Another tournament," said the coach, showing a paper chart on the wall. He had already drawn the lines for the teams who would advance. But first, he said, there would be a week's worth of practice with a partner, mastering (or attempting to master) the form and learning the method of scoring. He passed out pencils and long, narrow strips of photocopied paper with room for two players' scores across ten frames.

"Paper?" said one kid. "At the Bowl-o-Rama there's machines."

"Well, we ain't got no machines," said the coach. "Do your own math. It builds character."

Bella partnered with Angela. She spent the next forty-five minutes watching her ball ricochet weakly from one bumper to the other. It was maddening and embarrassing. Why? she thought. Why did anyone have to do this? Why had the state of Washington mandated that students in public schools be subjected to this kind of torture?

"One, two, three, four, five," said Angela. "Four steps is what I do. Then swing back on 'four' and roll the ball on 'five.'" She kept her twelve pound ball level with her eyes for the first three steps. As she swung back on the fourth, she swept her right leg behind her for the roll, getting her center of gravity down, bending at the left knee, and remaining in this balletic position until her ball struck the pins. She _always_ struck the pins, and she scored a strike or a spare about half the time. Her wrist was strong. Her fingers were firm and dry in the ball.

Bella thought the finger holes on her own six pound ball made it look like a coconut. Her ball thunked on the hardwood, and she saw the coach cringe, probably thinking about the basketball team and the money it would take to refurbish this floor over the summer. Angela's ball slid smoothly toward the pins, sometimes spinning backward as it went, like a dancer moonwalking. _At least I'm good at scoring,_ thought Bella. It was satisfying to place the numbers in their orderly boxes. At the end of the class, her best game was 63 points, and Angela had bowled a little over two hundred each time.

"Did you see Cody?" she whispered in the locker room as they changed back into their regular clothes.

"No."

"He's good at this. We might move up in the tournament with him."

"Not with me as your partner."

"What are you doing after school? We could go to the Bowl-o-Rama. Practice."

"I have to work," she said. "And maybe visit Vera."

"Tomorrow?"

"Maybe." It all depends, she thought, on what Jake needed, which depended on what the pack needed. Maybe Jake would have some free time. Maybe not. And maybe she could get Jake _out_ of the pack if they were going to act like a bunch of perverted assholes who peeked at each others' sex lives.

"Okay," said Angela. "Maybe I'll see Albertine tonight, too. Dinner there?"

Did she want to have dinner at Olympic Acres with the old ladies? No.

"Okay," she said.

The girls walked to history class. They were now studying World War II. This week's topic was women on the home front. Bella stared at a picture of Rosie the Riveter, enlarged and projected onto Mrs. Kranz's white screen, and liked the way Rosie rolled up her sleeves. She liked the way she had fixed a red handkerchief around her hair. She liked her determined expression, the power implied in her flexed bicep, and her red lips and black, arched eyebrows that said, _I'm strong!_ Bella realized that she would like to feel the way this woman looked. Of course, within this historical context Rosie's purposeful stance also said, _I've got your back, boys!_

It made Bella think that if she couldn't liberate Jake—or if he didn't want to be liberated—then maybe she could roll up her sleeves like Rosie. She scowled at her textbook, practicing the facial expression that went with the kick-ass ideas in Rosie's mind.

* * *

Quil phased back for the first time accidentally. When the vampire showed itself, Quil had staggered backward and tumbled into his original form as gracelessly as an elephant falling down a flight of stairs. His skin was sticky and damp from the change, but he was not technically naked because he stumbled and rolled, picking up dirt and leaves until he hit a tree trunk and jumped up, on his hands and knees, trying to force himself back into his hunting stance. Into his fanged, clawed, fighting stance. But he felt like a car that wouldn't start.

The vampire squatted on top of a granite boulder about fifteen feet over Quil's head. It looked at him, silent, for a long time. It cocked its head to one side, like a hawk or an owl.

Meanwhile, five other wolves raced toward the spot where they had last detected Quil's consciousness. They hoped they were going in the right direction. This hadn't happened before. Jacob cast his mind out, hoping that he could sense his cousin in the way he could sense his brother. He cast his mind like a net or a cape, flung over the forest, but he couldn't fling it very far because his heart was beating so hard and his breathing was labored.

You're not tired, said Sam, you're panicking.

Jacob gave a yelp. This was true.

I don't think he's dead, said Embry.

The black presence of the Alpha surged through the others' hearts. Calm. Purpose. Vigilance. Strength.

The vampire made a noise, a hum, testing its voice. It said, "Hmm," and Quil's ears stung with the sound. Quil missed his mother. Here he was, about to die, and she would never know. His skin reddened.

The vampire grinned and smacked its jaws as if chewing on a large wad of gum. "I think I know you," it said.

Quil wondered if this tree would protect him until the other wolves arrived. Surely they were on their way. He squeezed his mind and flexed his fingers, imagining claws. All he felt was a mild tingling.

On the boulder, the vampire reached behind itself and dragged out the warm, steaming carcass of a deer, holding it by a hoof. Its neck had been broken. The vampire took a bite out of its hide, spat the skin and hair onto the rock, and fastened its mouth over the wound. Quil saw the muscles in its neck working.

"You have a secret," it said, lifting its head for a moment. Then it resumed sucking.

The vampire was a young man. Curly brown hair waved back from its forehead, blond at the tips. Its eyes were bright red. Its bare, pale forearms were lightly freckled. "I can run so fast," it said, lifting its mouth once more. Blood reddened its chin. "I can crush _everything._ You would not believe this shit."

"Riley?" said Quil.

"Hmm," said the vampire. "Yeah. Yeah, familiar. Me?"

"Yes!" said Quil. "Yes."

"I think I'm supposed to kill you now."

Quil didn't know what to say to that. He tried again to urge himself into wolf form.

"You're all naked," said Riley. He slurped on the deer. "And you smell really bad, like wet dog. Do that thing again, where you look like a wolf."

"Believe me, I'm trying."

"My milkshake brings all the girls to the yard," sang Riley. His voice sounded golden and lovely in the morning pines. "Damn right, it's better than yours. I can teach you, but I have to charge."

"Milkshakes are good," said Quil. He tried to keep his voice from shaking. Tried to keep this thing talking.

"So good," agreed Riley. "My throat is burning. Do you have one? Chocolate? With Oreos? All I can find are these deer. They stink, too." With his fingernail, he flicked a little brown thing from the deer's flank. "I think that was a tick."

Something was wrong here.

"Funny," said Riley. "I'm a tick, too."

"No….." said Quil carefully. "You're a—"

"This girl. I think she slipped me something. Watch this." He rapped his knuckles on the rock and little bits of it crumbled off. Riley put a pea-sized crumb in his mouth and went, "Phoo!" spitting it at a tree the way one might spit a cherry pit at a lawn. The stone embedded itself in the bark like a bullet. Riley lay on the rock on his back and stared at the sky. "Can you take me home? I haven't slept in days. I might need to get to a hospital. I have never been so high for so long."

Five wolves skidded to a stop behind Quil.

"Don't kill it yet," said Quil.

* * *

After school at Newton's Outfitters, Bella cleaned the restroom, as usual, and sat on a stool behind the cash register for a long time. Tuesdays were usually slow. Mrs. Newton didn't ask her to straighten shelves or create a display; all she wanted to do was work with Mr. Newton over the accounts. They sat together in the office near the stockroom, looking at spreadsheets on the computer. After half an hour with _nothing_ happening except for one customer glancing at a few shirts and walking out again, Bella timidly knocked on the office door to ask if she might go out to her truck and get her homework. Of course, she promised, she would put it away immediately if any other customers came in. "No problem," said Mr. Newton. So she settled herself behind the cash register again with her Spanish book and Mary Shelley's _Frankenstein._ Around four o'clock, the phone rang, and when Bella answered, she was surprised to speak to Emily Young.

"Oh, Bella, I'm so glad it's you," she said. "I was going to have to pretend to be Quil's mom."

"Why?"

"To say that he's sick. That is, if he's supposed to work today. I don't even know."

"Is this another of your jobs?" said Bella suspiciously.

Emily was silent.

"You're the laundress, the chef, the guidance counselor, the nanny, _and_ the secretary?"

All Emily said was that somebody had to do it.

Fortunately, Quil wasn't supposed to work today. Bella opened a binder behind the counter and read Quil's schedule to Emily. It was pretty light. Just Saturdays and Monday afternoons.

"Maybe I should write down your schedule, too," said Emily, and Bella, thinking of the Newtons' spreadsheet, said yes, she should probably write down everybody's schedule.

"You should make a chart. Or a calendar. Does anybody else have a job?"

"Sam and Paul. Mostly Sam, though."

"Yeah. Make a calendar." She looked at her Spanish book. "And make them tell you all their school stuff, too, like when projects are due, and tests, and stuff like that."

"They don't know that. They just kind of drag themselves back to school now and then and try to figure out whatever they're currently flunking."

"That's _bad,"_ said Bella. "They should know their own homework. Geez. Mark down all their moms' birthdays, too, before they get kicked out of their houses."

Emily paused. After a moment she said, quietly, "There was another fight after you left yesterday."

Bella didn't want to hear about that. It was the pack's own stupid business, she thought, if they couldn't get along.

"Quil came," continued Emily. "He couldn't phase back yet, but he had already told the other guys that he wants to tell his mom about this."

"And?"

"And he's not alone. Pretty much everybody but Paul wants to talk about it. Sam says no, always no, but maybe it will change. I think it depends on what your dad has figured out. Jared doesn't care, either way. And they fought about that, and then I— I don't even know why I said this, but— Well, I said I was kind of tired. That I had a lot of work to do."

"Which you do…."

Emily hesitated again. "I cried. I'm so embarrassed about it now. They're working harder than me." She went on to describe what sounded to Bella like a monstrous argument: Kim crying, too, about the lack of privacy, and Quil running in circles, wanting his mom but embarrassed to let the others know, and Jacob folding his arms and saying that he wasn't going to make any decisions because he was adamantly not in charge of this mess, and Sam growling at everyone to be quiet and let him think, and Embry looking so miserable that it seemed like he wished he could disappear. Paul phased and just ran away, and Sam told Quil, still stuck as a wolf, to call him back, but that didn't work, not at all. Quil yelped as if stung and lay down with his paws over his nose. Kim cried on Jared's shoulder and talked about having a baby, and everyone but Jared yelled that that was a terrible idea, and then Sam yelled at Jared for _not_ saying what a bad idea that would be.

"Wow," said Bella. She didn't know what else to say.

"I wish I hadn't said anything. It was a mess." She made a strange little sound.

"Are you okay?"

"Or maybe we should talk about it more. I don't know. Should we? Maybe I should just never mention it again." There was another little sound.

"Are you crying?"

"No." But then there was a long pause, followed by a gasping, trembling rush of words with lots of sniffling. Bella couldn't understand it all, but it was something about the council, the laundry, Quil's mother, Sam's exhaustion, and her scars that itched as they healed. She said again that she felt ugly. Ugly in the mirror, ugly for complaining, ugly for not being able to keep up with her work, ugly for letting everybody down.

"What?" said Bella. "Stop."

Emily gave an enormous sniffle. "I'm done. I'm fine."

Bella frowned. Taking a look at her own life was hard, but seeing Emily's life was easier because she wasn't stuck in Emily's head. _Or MY head?_ she wondered. Anyway, it seemed to Bella that seeing Emily's life was easy, and that if anything was ugly around here, it was the amount of responsibility she was trying to handle on her own.

"Look," said Bella. "You are working really hard. You're like Superwoman. You need help."

"Could you do more laundry?" said Emily in a small voice.

 _No. Dammit,_ she thought. "Yes," she said. "But that's not enough help. Maybe Quil's right. Maybe some parents ought to know. They could help. They could wash their own stupid kids' laundry, for starters."

Emily didn't respond.

"You there?"

Nothing.

"Emily? Are you still there?"

"Can't breathe," she gasped.

"Are you sitting down?"

"Walking. Can't breathe."

Suddenly Bella could diagnose this. "Around and around? Are you walking around and around."

"More like back… and forth. Can't breathe."

Yep, it was just as Bella had suspected. She knew this feeling. And she felt a hot rush of anger and indignation that anyone else should feel it. It was a horrible feeling! How dare those boys make Emily feel this way, she thought. She also thought, in a rare flash of human insight, that maybe this was the side of Emily that needed Leah. Like yin and yang. And what would Leah do? Leah would kick the shit out of those boys for… for… something. For making Emily upset.

"This is called a panic attack," she said in her wisest voice.

"A pah—?" gasped Emily.

"Panic. Attack. Very bad." Things must really be bad, she thought, if the girl who had told her to stand up to a vampire and meet her death like an adult was panicking. In the background, in Sam's kitchen, she supposed, Bella heard a tiny beeping sound.

"Muffins," gasped Emily.

Bella figured it must be the oven timer. "Fuck the muffins," she snarled, then clapped a hand over her mouth and looked behind her to see if the Newtons had heard that. "Forget about the muffins," she hissed more quietly.

"They'll burn!"

"Let them burn. Stupid muffins! You are burning. You are crashing and burning!"

"Wha—? Maybe I should… sit down?"

"No. Stand up. When Laurent was there, you said to stand up. I am helping you. Stand."

Another voice was heard in the background, words Bella couldn't understand, and the oven timer stopped beeping. "They're ruined!" Emily cried. The other voice came nearer, and then Emily was crying on somebody's shoulder. There was a lot of babbling and gasping.

"Is that Ellen?" said Bella. "Is she helping?"

"Yes," sniffed Emily. "I think— I think she's giving me an H - U - G."

"I'm bilingual, not illiterate," grumbled the other voice.

Bella was glad Emily hadn't fainted. But the problem remained.

"Chuck the muffins," she said. "Don't make another batch." When Emily said they couldn't afford to throw them out, Bella told her to make the boys come into the house and eat the wretched muffins while watching her give a demonstration on how to use the flipping washing machine. And for that matter, maybe Ellen could do some laundry, too.

"I think she's too old," whispered Emily.

In the background, Bella heard a grumbled, "I can hear you."

"So you're okay now?" said Bella.

"Yes. No. Oh, I'm sorry. Don't tell anyone I cried. I'm just going to—"

"You're going to make them pick up the slack!

"I am?"

"Yes!"

"How?"

"Stand _UP!"_ she said, echoing Emily's advice to her, and then she hung up the phone with a satisfying smack. Leah had done that to her once, too, telling her to "man up," and it had been effective. Bella hoped that would be effective with Emily, too. For all she knew, Leah had done that to her a thousand times. Feeling pleased with herself and her advice, Bella returned to her Spanish homework. It required a lot of concentration. _Me encanta la luna. Y la luna me quiere._ But after she finished, she had nothing to do but watch the door, wipe the counter clean as can be, and stew over one little thing that Emily had said: "I think it depends on what your dad has figured out."

What did that mean?

Bella got a paper towel, wadded it around the end of a ball point pen, moistened the towel with all-purpose cleanser, and began to scrub grime from between the keys on the cash register, trying to lose herself in the pleasure of making tiny things really, really clean. In her mind, she could still see Joy Ateara streaking across Billy's snowy yard on the night of Jake's birthday party, after her windowsill had caused an explosion, shouting, "Quilly! Quilly!" His nose had been bleeding all down his front from the fight with Paul, and she hugged him so hard that she probably ruined her clothes. She had kicked up a fine, cold spray as she ran, her black hair streaming behind her. She had to be at least forty years old, and she was a little heavy. Yet she sprinted like a deer.

Renee had never done anything like that.

The bell over the front door jingled, and a woman came in looking for wool socks. Sliding her homework onto a shelf below the counter, Bella directed her to the shoe section (the socks were there, too) and rang up the purchase for her. When she had gone, she resumed cleaning the keyboard. It was disgusting, she thought, what people carried around under their fingernails. Had this keyboard ever been cleaned? It was a good thing Mrs. Newton had her. But no matter how hard she scrubbed, no matter how hard she stared at the gummed up end of the paper towel, she couldn't gross herself out hard enough to distract her thoughts from Charlie.

 _If he figures this out, would Quil be allowed to tell Joy?_ She wondered if maybe she ought to go ahead and tell him, for the sake of Quil and Joy. For a moment she felt sourly that Joy could go ahead and continue freaking out, what the heck, because if she herself didn't have a mother like that, then no one else should have one either. But just as soon as she thought it, she reproved herself and added to the list:

Boy with mother who deeply gives a shit, held apart from her.

Mother with son who deeply gives a shit, held apart from him.

Also, she added this:

Mother and child who have lost their husband and father to the sea, held apart from each other, the only single people they have left.

Old Quil, she figured, didn't count. He had failed to warn Quil, which had led to Quil's being terrified, screaming and breaking apart in the meadow, with blood everywhere, which in turn led to her feeling _so angry_ at him. Horrible old man!

Her head hurt. She had spent months being depressed, and now it felt as if she was going to be angry for… for as long as Jake and Quil and Embry and Emily—and even Joy—had to deal with this shit.

She finished cleaning the register and threw away the icky paper towel. Then she got a new one and started poking at the corners of the monitor. But they were not dusty enough to distract her. It would be nice not to have to _think_ for a while. She glanced at the stockroom and the office. The Newtons were still absorbed in their accounting, so she picked up the phone on the front counter and made an outgoing call.

"Ange? Could we still go bowling tonight?"

* * *

They took Riley to the Cullens' place because they didn't know where else to put him. Jake jimmied the lock. Inside, the house smelled horrible: a blend of dust and dried flowers, with a heavy, sweet sting in the air. Coughing, the boys opened the windows and turned on the fan above the stove to create a little air circulation.

"Why is the electricity still on?" asked Quil. "Are they still paying the bill?" Sam turned on a faucet, and they saw that the water district continued to serve the house.

Nobody wanted to think about the implications of that. Instead they moved from room to room, checking for anything unusual. In the closets, they found tasteful, well-made clothing on velvet-covered hangers. In the bathrooms, they found scented soaps nestled in porcelain dishes so fine they were translucent. The beds were made with smooth, cool linens pulled tight and tucked in, and in the master bedroom, on a bureau top, a strand of pearls lay coiled like a snake.

Riley was not put off by any of this. He drew his finger along the keyboard of the grand piano and across the back of the white leather sofa. "This place is really nice. Do you guys live here?"

"No," coughed Sam.

From a hall that led to Carlisle's office, Embry came stumbling, forcing Paul ahead of him. Paul was trembling. His eyes were glazed over, and he had unzipped his fly. "This one wants to pee on everything," Embry explained. "Needs fresh air."

"Don't pee in their territory," said Jared. "It'll just piss them off." A slow smile spread over his face. "Get it?"

"Ha, ha, ha," said Sam sourly. To Embry, he said, "Get him out of here."

"Thirsty," said Riley.

The boys were prepared for this. Sam nodded at Quil, and Quil reached into a pillowcase he'd been dragging around for most of the day. It was filled with a squirming mess of misfortunate squirrels. "I can't believe I'm using my lightning reflexes to do this," Sam had grumbled every time he snuck up on a little critter and pounced. "I cannot believe this." Jared just shrugged. He turned the task into a game. Sam, 6; Jake, 6; Embry, 7; Quil, 2; Jared 9; and Paul zero. Paul pointed out that he earned the zero not by failing to catch anything, but by refusing to try. "You win MVP," said Embry. "Most Valuable Prick," said Jacob. "Thank you," said Paul.

Now, as Embry coaxed a half-rabid Paul outside, Quil tossed a squirrel to Riley. It made a final squeak as it flew across the living room, and Riley snapped its little neck before peeling half of its skin off. Its red flesh slowly turned pinkish-gray while Riley sucked on it. The boys looked away. Quil wished he could snap the rest of the squirrels' necks to put them (and himself) out of their misery, but Riley preferred them fresh.

Sam lifted his nose and said, "Dammit, Paul, quit peeing on the house. Go patrol." Embry returned alone, carrying a thick, heavy book. _Psychology: An Understanding_ was printed on the glossy, black cover. On the spine was a yellow and black sticker that said, "Used."

"Sit down," said Jared. "Make yourself comfortable." Riley chose a seat in a reclining chair and put the footrest up. He leaned back, crossing his ankles, and smiled at the boys, all of whom said they preferred to stand.

 _We need Bella,_ Embry said to Jake. Sam lifted his nose again, as if to detect the silent communication that was unique to the brothers and becoming stronger every day. Was it instinct? Shared purpose? Similar personalities? Or the fact that the two of them functioned best in proximity? They were opposites, yet the same. Sun and moon. Extrovert and introvert. Hope and despair. Two sides of a coin, flashing in the sunlight as it spun and fell. _We need Bella._

"No," Jake responded.

Embry looked at the floor.

They were dominance and submission.

"It's okay," said Jared. "What does the book say?"

"Memory loss can be caused by trauma," said Embry, quietly turning the pages. "In this nascent state, the patient is highly suggestible. Controlled exposure to the trigger is not recommended."

Sam said that didn't explain enough. In their cautious conversations with Riley, as they tramped through the forest, they had gathered that Victoria, the red-haired vampire, had turned him, submerged his body in an icy stream for three days—neither the wolves nor Riley knew why—and then said she had to go to Seattle to get something. "We're in love," Riley had said, gazing at the clear blue sky as they walked him through the woods and fields to the Cullens' home. "She's been through so much. Someone murdered her brother."

"Wow," said the boys. "That's so sad." Behind Riley's back, they exchanged worried glances. That was all the information—the coherent information—they could get out of him. He was jittery and emotional, so it was hard to reach him sometimes. Other times, he walked before them in inexplicable serenity, holding his hands in the sun and demanding that they see how much they sparkled.

"He thinks he's high," whispered Quil as they walked, but of course Riley heard this and turned around, stricken. "You mean I'm not?" he cried. "Then what the fuck is happening? What's happening?" He raced away in horror and confusion, snapping tree branches and tumbling into a river. His heart, if the organ that continued to pump venom through his body could still be called a heart, hammered so hard that Sam, who had been inclined to shred him and be done with it, had relented. The boys knew from his memories that his own heart had sounded the same for days on end when he first phased. He had had no one. The boys pretended not to know this. It was one of the small comforts they could give each other. So no one asked why when Sam changed his mind and told them all to just let Riley think he was high. What was the harm in that?

Embry had leaned against and tree and thought, _God, I wish_ I _was high right now,_ and Jacob had frowned at him.

Now they stood in the Cullens' perfect home, with its white leather and walls of glass, and wondered how much they could suggest to this highly suggestible creature without triggering any traumatic memories of whatever Victoria had done to him. _Was convincing him that they're in love a type of trauma,_ wondered Jacob. _Or does he truly love her? How long has he known her?_

 _This is why we need Bella,_ his brother responded, and Sam said, "Stop that."

"Thirsty," said Riley, holding out the limp squirrel. "Where should I put this? Fireplace? Maybe under this cushion." Quil looked at Sam, who looked at the pillowcase. Grimly, Quil accepted the dead one and tossed another live one to Riley. As he put the dead one back into the pillowcase, he felt sorry for the other squirrels. Now they knew what was coming to them. Riley slurped what he could out of the new squirrel and handed its body to Quil. Then he got up and began to explore the house. The boys trailed after him from room to room. In the bathroom, Riley paused in front of the mirror.

"I'm gorgeous!" he said. "Look at my hair! Look at my face! Look at my muscles!" The boys looked away as he peeled off his shirt and flexed his biceps. For a moment he wondered why his eyes were red, but the sight of his rock-hard, perfect abs distracted him. Then he pulled the waist band of his pants out a few inches and looked down. "Wow! Everything looks good! You guys should see this!"

"No!" they all said at once.

Sam flicked his eyes between Jared and Riley, and then jerked his chin toward the hall. Jared folded his arms and leaned on the doorframe, offering pleasantries and an easy smile while Riley continued to admire himself, and everyone else followed Sam down the hall and outside, where they hoped Riley's acute hearing would not reach.

"What are we going to do?" they whispered.

Embry said—aloud—that they needed Bella, to which Jacob said no and Quil said why? Because she knows more than we do, hissed Embry. Think about it, he said. Bella might know if it was normal for new vampires to have only hazy memories of their human lives. She might know if they had any special weaknesses or strengths. For all they knew, these newbies could fly like a bat.

"They can't," whispered Sam. "For fuck's sake."

"Well, how long are we going to have to babysit him?" whispered Jacob. "They don't need to sleep. We do."

"And I don't want anyone alone with him," said Sam, glancing nervously at the house. "We should get back in there. We should have two wolves on him at all times."

Quil offered to take the first shift, but Sam said no, you can't phase right yet. Embry posited that Quil stalled out because Riley was not a threat. Sam stared hard at the grass, thinking. At last he said that Jake should go looking for Bella, Quil should get in touch with his inner rage and try to phase back with Jared's help, and he, Embry, and Embry's book would take the first shift. "We'll suggest nice things to him," he said grimly. "And nobody mentions the V-word."

* * *

At six o'clock, Mrs. Newton said that Bella could go. She gathered her homework and clocked out. As horrible as she was at bowling, she was looking forward to the echo and clatter of the Bowl-o-Rama and a human being's company. The yellow lights in the parking lot had flickered to life. In their glow, parked beside her truck, she saw a little red hatchback and a tall boy leaning against it. When she ran to him, he crushed her against his warm chest and put his nose in her hair.

Some things had changed, and some hadn't. She squirmed away long enough to put her books and keys on the Rabbit's hood, and he kept a hand on her the whole time, eager to touch, to be connected. Then she wrapped her arms around his waist and breathed in the scent of his t-shirt, his skin, the piney smell that clung to him from the woods. He kissed her forehead, timidly at first, keeping his nose in her hair, then kissed her nose and cheeks. He kissed her eyelashes. With his nose, he nudged her forehead, cheeks, and chin until she lifted her face and met his gaze. What she saw there made her heart ache.

"I'm sorry," he whispered. His black eyes flickered as he watched her reaction. "For the— For thinking about— You know. With the others."

"It's okay," she said. She'd had time to think about this. "It was just imagining."

He still looked pained. "As much as I hate to say this, if you don't want to— If you want to go back to being just friends—"

Bella looked at the ground. "I didn't know you thought about that stuff." Just the idea made her blush, and she felt again a distance between them.

He sighed and leaned back against the car with his hands shoved into his pockets. "Well, I do. Or I did, once or twice. I can't help it." But to tell the truth, he said, he'd also thought about it with Sofia Vergara, the actress, and one of his teachers, which horrified everybody in the pack, including himself, because she was at least sixty years old. "I don't know where that came from," he said. "And the more I tell myself not to think about something, the more I do, and then I start wondering what would be really embarrassing to think about, and the next thing you know I'm doing it with a tree or something." That had indeed been embarrassing. Morning wood, said everybody.

"That's kind of weird, Jake."

"Well, _you_ try it. Try NOT to think of having sex with the next guy who walks by, or with that piece of paper—" he pointed at a bit of trash scuttling over the asphalt in the wind "—or with a sea otter—"

"No animals, please."

"Tell me you're not thinking about it."

 _Darn it._ She _had_ thought about it long enough to know that she never wanted to have sex with a sea otter. Where were their little penises? Would it bite her? She crossed her arms over her chest and frowned at her feet.

"See?" said Jacob. "Now if you were me, you'd have to listen to shit for days about your insane— Crap. I just thought about it, too. Now they're going to make it worse. They're going to think up pictures for me, pictures of otters and seals in black thongs."

"You like black thongs?"

His face went pink. "I don't know," he mumbled. "I never saw one."

The wind lifted the hair on Bella's neck, making her shiver. It stung the corners of her eyes, too, where tears threatened. It was good of him, she thought, to offer her a chance to take up their old relationship, one where only imagined things might be shared. She hadn't thought of that herself. She realized it was because she didn't want to give him up. Images of sea creatures in slinky negligees came unbidden to her mind. What would it be like to do it with a starfish? Would it take a long time? Would it leave tiny feet marks all over her skin? How did those things reproduce anyway? If Angela knew she had imagined sex with a starfish, Angela would think it was weird, but she wouldn't tease her about it. This was because Angela wasn't a dickhead. Poor Jake had Paul in his head. As much as she didn't want Paul to see her underwear, she also didn't want Jake to suffer for seeing her underwear and thinking about it.

 _Darn it. Now I thought of Jake seeing my underwear._ Her face went pink, too, and Jacob watched her, curious, scared. There was just one other thing that still bothered her, but she wasn't sure if she could talk about it.

"What?" he said, nudging her foot with his own. He always knew, she thought. He knew when she was worried or upset. When she moved into his arms again, he let out a trembling sigh. "Don't go," he said. His voice sounded tight. "Please."

"I feel different from you," she managed to say. "I'm not ready for that stuff."

He set his chin on the top of her head. "That's what's really bothering you?"

Yes, she realized.

Jacob hugged her closer, whispering, "I'm not either."

* * *

In the bowling alley, Bella slumped in a plastic seat and tried not to pout. She might have known that Jake would be really good at bowling. He was really good at everything, she thought—everything athletic. Not so good at Shakespeare. She remembered Leah saying that he couldn't explicate a sonnet to save his life. This thought gave her comfort as she watched Angela and Jake laughing, high-fiving one another, as their scores flashed over the screen above their lane and the pins cracked and tumbled. Jacob was rolling a twenty-pound ball. On his first turn, he'd sent the ball through the pins and hit the wall in the dark cave behind the re-setting machine. There was a loud thump that caused the manager and several others to stare at them, and Jake looked alarmed. After that, he played with more restraint.

The bowling alley served pizza, which Jake and Bella made their dinner, and then she called Charlie from a disgusting pay phone in the hall near the restrooms. Its silver surface was scratched with graffitied genitals. There was gum on the bottom of it. The receiver looked suspiciously too shiny. She had to plunk forty-five cents into the machine just to let Charlie know where she was, and as she hung up the filthy thing, she thought that maybe if she put in more hours at Newton's, she could afford a cell phone. Then she ducked into the ladies room to wash her hands.

After Angela and Jake had bowled ten frames with wild, ridiculous glee, they seemed to remember her. "Awww," Jake said. "Come on; let me show you." Jake gave her a six-pound ball and held her arm in the right position while Angela counted "One, two, three, four, five," with her steps. She rolled a lot of gutter balls, but Jacob figured out that she could shift her body to prevent sideways shots, and Angela schooled her into following one, and only one, method. "One, two, three, four—swing—, five—roll," whispered Bella. When she finally rolled a strike, she shrieked.

"We're going to have a shot," said Angela, talking about the tournament. This must have gotten her thinking about Cody, which must have gotten her thinking about Quil. She asked about him.

"He's been sick," said Jacob smoothly. It was the standard answer to the all-too-common question of what's-going-on-with-(fill-in-the-blank)-packmember.

"Oh," said Angela. She bent over her red and tan leather bowling shoes, untying the laces, and tucked a strand of hair behind her ears. Bolder than Bella, she said what was on her mind: "Do you think he ever thinks about me?"

"No," said Jacob. Then his eyes widened as he realized both how certain he sounded and how bad it might feel to hear that.

Angela bent over her laces again, letting her hair swing over her face.

"You want me to tell him you said hi?" offered Jacob.

"If you want."

"He's got a lot on his mind," Jake back pedaled. "Missing school. New job. Being sick."

"Mm-hmm," said Angela. "Well, tell him I hope he feels better, I guess."

"Sure, sure."

They turned in their rented shoes and went out to the parking lot.

"Do you think I hurt her feelings?" said Jake as Angela drove away.

"Maybe." Bella bit her lip. "But she has a back-up plan."

Jacob wasn't sure what a back-up plan meant when it came to dating, but it gave him an uncomfortable feeling. Did many girls think like this? Did they rank boys in their heads and pursue them in order of preference? Was this something he should warn Quil about? Or should he tell Quil to get his head out of his ass and notice the fact that after years of hoping and smack talk and empty boasts, a girl had finally noticed him? Should he tell him that this girl had a back-up plan? Would that plan involve a different boy, or a different way to approach Quil?

He opened the Rabbit's passenger door for Bella. It was eight o'clock now. He drove her back to Newton's so she could get her truck, and when he parked beside it, the good feeling from the bowling alley began to evaporate. He knew it would. Happiness was hollow, fleeting. That's why he threw himself into when he could find it, forcefully suppressing the niggling thought that it would soon be gone. He and Embry had been talking about this, which meant that everyone had been talking about it. Or at least, everyone was aware of it.

Jacob stared out the window as Bella sat beside him, silent. Just yesterday, he and Embry had been thinking about his birthday party. They were running on either side of the Hoh River, heading east. Jacob thought about unwrapping his gifts, having cake, having everyone laughing and crowded into his father's kitchen.

 _Must have been nice,_ thought Embry.

 _But you were in the woods. Now I know that._

 _Doesn't mean the party wasn't nice._

 _But it was—_ Well, what was it? Childish? Selfish? Wrong to be having fun while his brother was hurting? As he ran over the moss, the fur between his toe pads instantly soaked, he let his mind go loose, trying to name this feeling. His mind searched for words in a wordless way, sinking into memory and emotion, blurred images of his mother, the soft fur of a cat he'd once had, a cat who had given birth to kittens in the garage. He'd loved those kittens. And Billy had said they couldn't keep them. He remembered his mother and father talking about the kittens. Six of them. All black. His mind sank farther, wondering why, why did they have to get rid of them? He felt another cognitive slackening, deep memory turning to color, a muddied red, a muted orange, and then he felt a sharp pain in his mind.

It was Paul. Paul had followed his memories into their hole. Paul had seen his kittens squirming in his lap. He had felt Jacob's childhood happiness and his doubt, as a first grader, about loving his father when his father didn't love the kittens. He had seen him waver, had seen a little boy kneeling over a cardboard box in the garage and the shame he felt for doubting his father.

 _Get out,_ Jacob had said, shocked that anyone could probe so deeply into his head.

 _You hate your mom?_ Paul said. _Because she didn't stick up for you?_

Jacob felt Paul needling deeper into his mind, finding the emotion he'd felt when he'd come home from school one day and the kittens were gone.

 _You act like your mom was so perfect,_ said Paul.

As Jacob roared at him, Embry's mind froze, ice glazing over whatever he'd been thinking about. They hadn't known Paul was phased with them. How could they not have been aware of him? They couldn't even figure out where Paul was running, so forceful were the thoughts he directed away from himself. It was as if Paul's mind were a burning sun, blasting every eye that looked his way. Something black and tangled writhed in the fire of Paul's mind, and the brothers' curiosity was repelled by another wave of blazing, white-hot hatred.

 _You're still wondering what happened to them,_ Paul said. _I bet Billy killed them._

Stumbling, Jacob had phased back and sat with his back to a cedar tree, sticky and nude. He looked for Embry's mind, and the gray, lean wolf leapt a gorge and found him where he sat shivering, trying not to cry, because Paul would see that, too. Later. And it was possible that Paul would also see how he, at seven years old, had held the mother cat and sobbed, alone in the garage, with the engorged teats of the cat leaking milk onto his knees. The gray wolf curled around him, warming him. They sat that way for a long time. Every now and then, the wolf would lift half a lip and growl at something Jacob could not see.

"What's wrong?" said Bella.

Jacob took a deep breath. What was wrong? Lots and lots of things.

"We have to talk," he sighed, and his last bit of joy floated away like a balloon.

He hardly knew where to begin. Riley seemed like the most important matter. As he told her about their discovery, which was hopefully still in the Cullens' house, snacking on rodents and falling in love with himself in the mirror, Jacob watched Bella's emotions. Tears came to her eyes. With Bella, he knew, this was not unusual. "Poor Riley," she said, smudging her hands over her eyes. Jacob felt his heart lift a little bit. She hadn't said, "Lucky Riley." He smelled the trace of salt on her fingertips and wanted to kiss them.

The pack had so many questions, he continued. Was there anything special they should know about new vampires? (Other than the fact, thought Jacob, that they smelled like battery acid and rotten fruit.) How long had he known Victoria? Could he really love her? What could she be doing in Seattle while he was supposed to wait for her? He told her about the icy stream thing, and how he seemed to barely remember his human life.

"Have you ever been high?" he asked.

"Nooooo….?" she said, thinking of the time she and Angela had eaten lunch with the stoner kids under an awning full of smoke, and later she'd felt strange.

"Well, he thinks he's high. Doesn't understand what he is now."

Bella sat staring at him with a little pucker between her eyebrows.

How should they break it to him, Jacob wanted to know, and what about his family? What should the boys tell them, if anything? And what about Charlie and the other cops? They should stop their search. Riley was eating lots of deer and little animals, but maybe he would snap and go for people. And good Lord, was it normal for new vampires to be so thirsty?

"He's eating deer?" Bella wiped the back of her hand across her nose.

"Among other things." He wrinkled his nose in disgust and sat watching her emotions again, waiting for her to say something. Waiting for her to save them, he realized, by giving them a great big platter of information. Waiting for her to tell them what to do.

"What should we do?" said Bella.

Jacob felt a surge of love for her. She was so good and sweet, he thought, and she needed him. Sam, he knew, would find her question annoying, but oh, how Jacob loved her. He loved her so much. And he needed her too. For a moment he wondered if he needed her to need him, and then he felt confused and thought, _Shut up, Jake._

"Where is he?" asked Bella. "Can I see him?"

"No," he said sharply. She looked hurt, so he added, "He might be dangerous."

"He's my friend."

"He doesn't remember things like that."

"I could jog his memory."

A horrible vision flashed through his mind, a vision of Riley leaping at her. "No, please, no." Riley would peel her skin back and put his mouth on her before he understood what he was doing. Jacob unbuckled his seat belt and took her hand, pulling it to his lips, saying, "No, no, no, no, no."

Bella frowned. Edward had said things like this. Don't do this, and don't do that.

Jacob sensed her irritation. In the wrist that he held to his lips, her pulse gave one hearty throb and settled again. "You're mad," he said.

"I don't want anybody to tell me what to do," she replied.

 _Anybody,_ he noticed. _Not me in particular._ In his mind, he had a box called Bella. He tucked this kernel inside it. Maybe it was related to Edward.

"I don't want you to get hurt," he said, and then he knew for sure it was related to Edward because she got teary again, saying, "Are you going to leave me?" and her pulse spiked again. He saw her through Sam's eyes, bleeding on the forest floor when Sam had been a pack of one. Sam smelled the reek of vampire all over her, so strong he wondered if she'd been drained. He'd thought for a moment that he'd found her corpse. Jacob saw and felt what Sam had, which made his own pulse spike and his own eyes fill with tears. _Shit,_ he thought, _now I'm a mess._ "No, of course not," he answered.

A long time later, he was cursing himself again, but for a different reason. He and Bella were wondering what time it was. Neither had a watch or a car fancy enough to have a dashboard clock. The Thriftway, which was next to Newton's, had closed and there were no other cars left in the parking lot. Bella got out of the Rabbit and ran to look at the hours posted on the grocery store door. "It closes at nine," she said, which told them that it was at least an hour after they'd left the bowling alley. Bella sat down in the Rabbit again and tried to comb her hair with her fingers. Jacob told himself not to help, or they'd end up losing track of time again.

Oops.

Bella had a pink bra. He had not dared to hope to see such a thing, but Bella had let him see it, or part of it, and oh, God, it was pink. Not hot pink and bright, but a quiet, pale, soft color, like a flower, he thought, though he wished he could think of a better comparison. When they'd been talking about Riley, he had almost cried, and then Bella had taken his other hand and kissed it, and then he'd kissed her hand, and she'd kissed his again, and he'd kissed the salt off one of her fingertips, and then she'd stroked her thumb over his jaw and said, "You have a whisker." A few, he replied. She found them and touched them, and shivers rolled through his body, and he leaned toward her and put his nose on her cheek, just in front of her ear, brushing his lips against her skin but not quite kissing, until he felt her shiver, too. "Is this okay?" he had said. "Yes," she had whispered. "But it's not completely private," he had reminded her. "Just try," she had said. "Try not to think of it later." And she had kissed him. A lot.

He wanted never to get out of this car. He squirmed in his seat, feeling a little uncomfortable, hoping Bella wouldn't notice. The parking brake had been their only chaperone. He was half-afraid to touch her, keeping his hands on her arms and shoulders, maybe her neck. Places he had touched before. It could have been because this physical experience was new for both them, or because they'd been friends for so long that it was hard to move past that. Or add to that. Or expand it. Deepen it, he wondered? Was that the right word? She, too, had been hesitant with her hands. He liked them on his shoulders. Once she'd put a hand on his knee, leaning closer. Her touch was light, barely brushing the denim over his skin, and he wanted so badly not to mess this up by going too fast. _She is my treasure,_ he thought. There was a moment when she let her head fall back when his lips were on the hollow of her throat, and impulsively, he'd slipped a finger beneath the neckline of her t-shirt and whispered, "Can I see this?" She slid the fabric away to reveal an inch of a slender, pink satin bra strap. In the dark, he couldn't tell if she was blushing or not.

Now he watched her combing her hair and hoped she wouldn't look at him too closely. Fortunately—or unfortunately—the blindingly bright spotlight of a Forks police cruiser, suddenly directed at the Rabbit, immediately killed any need for modesty.

Bella's eyes got very large. "Maybe it's one of the deputies," she whispered.

But no, it was Charlie.

Bella sat waiting for him to put on his show like when he'd pretended to arrest Jacob for speeding on his birthday. She waited for his menacingly slow stalk to the driver's side door, flashlight in hand. But he wasn't even in uniform. Wearing his favorite green sweater and jeans, he merely tapped on Jacob's window with his knuckle. When Jacob rolled it down, all he said was, "I need you two to come with me."

* * *

The Cullens' glass mansion glowed brightly in its dark clearing, light spilling from all its windows. Inside, Sam and Embry followed Riley from room to room. He was restless, touching everything, marveling at the textures of silk and velvet, chiffon and organza, and how intensely fantastic they felt. He asked the boys if they'd ever felt anything like this. So soft. So many tiny fibers in the lavender, brushed velvet pillows in the bedroom they assumed belonged to the tiny one, that black-haired, icy pixie. Embry wanted to know her name, but he didn't want to ask Sam aloud. He wondered if Jacob knew. Jake was away somewhere, too far for him to ask, but Embry practiced reaching for him.

"Ooh," said Riley, drawing his pinky finger over the velvet pillows, then the stainless steel bed frame. The steel was cold. Hard. He touched the pillow, then the frame. Soft, hard, soft, hard, soft, hard, until he said, "I feel dizzy." Sinking to the floor, he sat on a thick carpet knotted in a florid pattern of violet, cream, sandy brown, and wine red. Blood red. Embry thought it was probably hand-knotted by children tied to looms in some far away country, and he wondered vaguely if the littlest Cullen, with her tiny fingers and infinite time, might learn to knot her own damn fancy carpet.

"Whose house is this?" wondered Riley, passing his hand over the carpet.

"So," said Sam. "What do you do?"

"I'm just touching this rug."

"No, for a living. Or, how do you spend your time?" This question, Sam thought, might be a good way to help Riley remember something pleasant from his life.

Riley sighed. Then held his breath. Then held it longer. And longer. He frowned. Held it a little longer…. "Why am I not breathing?" he said.

"You are," said Sam. "Of course you are."

Riley closed his mouth and pinched his nose.

Sam did not like this experiment. He looked sideways at Embry, who said, "Knock knock."

"Who's there?" said Riley.

"Lettuce."

"Lettuce who?"

"Let us in. It's cold outside."

Sam smiled, pretending the joke was funny. Embry had distracted him, ending the breath holding. Downstairs, a grandfather clock began to chime. They counted the bell tones: ten o'clock.

It had been a tense afternoon. Riley had watched television for a while, but they'd had to monitor his viewing. Cooking shows made him question why he wanted to eat squirrels like they were Cheetos. News programs made him confused. Who were these people in suits, and why were they always arguing? ESPN turned out to be a safe choice, and they had watched soccer for hours. Riley knew all the rules and many of the players on the English teams, which made them guess that he'd been a player, or at least a big fan, in his human life. Embry wished the Cullens had some board games. Couldn't they at least play Scrabble while they were sitting around? Or Monopoly? Anything.

"I'm so bored," said Riley, jumping up from the luxurious carpet and rolling his shoulders, bouncing on his toes like a boxer getting ready to step into the ring. "Let's go kill something."

"What?" said Sam and Embry.

"What?" said Riley. "What did I say?"

"Nevermind," said Sam.

"You don't like killing things," said Embry.

"I don't?"

"Noooo… No. You love hugs and stuff. Rainbows and bunnies."

"I do?"

"Yes." It was time to suggest nice things. "You like helping people."

"And camping," said Sam. "Camping is fun."

"Camping…." said Riley. "Yeah. I wonder when Victoria is coming back."

"You don't like her," said Embry.

"Yes, I do," snapped Riley. His red eyes flashed. "We're in love. We're going to get married. But first we have to find the one who killed her brother."

Sam suggested that they watch more soccer, but Riley said he probably ought to try to sleep. He'd been awake for days, he reminded them, and when he came down off whatever Victoria had given him, he would probably crash hard. Once again, Sam and Embry trailed after him from room to room. Riley would lie down on one of the beds and remain there for several minutes, perfectly still, staring at the ceiling, then get up and try sleeping in a different bed. None was quite right. Too hard, too soft, too big, too small. Each time he jumped up and paced restlessly to another room, Embry thought that this was like babysitting a dangerously unstable Goldilocks.

At last Jared and Paul came to relieve them. Quil, Jared reported, was running on all fours again. Jared had assigned him to patrol an arc near Forks. He suggested that Embry join Quil and that Sam get home to Emily.

"She needs you," Jared said.

"She's threatening to speak to the management," added Paul.

"Which would be me," said Sam.

"No," said Jared slowly. "It's pretty bad. She means the other management."

Sam's expression sank. Nodding at Jared, he slipped out of the house, jogged across the meadow, and disappeared into the trees.

"Bye?" said Riley. "He didn't say goodbye."

"Is she bad off?" said Embry.

"Yes," snapped Paul. "But nothing's going to change."

* * *

Grimly, Charlie opened the cruiser's door and Bella and Jacob climbed into the backseat. Into the cage, as he called it. His demeanor invited no questions. Joy was in the front seat, and when she turned around to look at them, Bella saw that her eyes were red and puffy.

Charlie drove north out of town and turned left onto the 110 spur to La Push. It was a clear, cool evening. Stars were out, and the clock on the dashboard said it was nearly ten thirty. As the fields and trees rolled by, Jacob thought of all the things Sam had wanted him to talk to Bella about, and all the things he had wanted to talk to her about. Not just about Riley, but also about the fight that broke out after the pack meeting yesterday, and the good parts of the pack mind. He'd wanted to talk to her about leadership, which he was supposed to have assumed, and how confused he felt. Angry and confused. And he supposed he ought to talk about imprinting, too, though he wasn't sure how much Emily had already told her.

Jacob remembered the day he had snuck out of school to drive to Hoquiam with Bella. He had climbed out of the girls' bathroom window and run along the road, pushing tag-along Leah in her wheelchair, feeling the cold air in his lungs, his heart pounding. He felt so alive. On the road, he'd rolled down his window and leaned out, letting the wind push tears from his eyes as his long hair whipped behind him. Later, Quil said the school had been cheering for him. Whooping as he ran away. Jacob Black, model student, future chief, peacemaker and friend to all, giving a giant, metaphorical middle finger to the school with every stride. His teacher had assigned him to write an essay about not taking responsibility, but it wasn't meant to be a punishment. Though she could never say so, he suspected his teacher had been proud of him.

A slow, stupid grin spread over his sixteen-year-old face. A couple hours in his car with Bella and a glimpse of her pink bra was worth whatever Sam would throw at him later. Sam wanted to step down, but Jacob didn't want to be in a pack, much less be in charge of one. A million half-formed thoughts clamored for his attention: keeping Forks safe, catching Victoria, dealing with Riley, mediating the pack's arguments, grinding Paul's nose into the dirt, finding a way to support Emily, and avoiding his father and the anger and resentment he felt toward him. Also, there was the matter of Bella's stuff in Old Quil's shed. The stuff smelled like death and radiated menace like a bomb. He wanted to shove all those thoughts away, and he wondered if this was how Bella coped. It required a lot of effort. But he felt he was up to it. Especially since he had her now. He slid his hand over the vinyl seat between them and found hers.

As for Bella, she wondered what Charlie—and Joy—had figured out. Nothing good could come of driving to La Push late at night with Joy in tears and Jake and herself in a cage. What this what Emily meant? Something depended on Charlie?

Joy turned her head to look at Charlie. By the movement of her left shoulder, Bella suspected that she was sliding her hand across the vinyl seat, too. Charlie glanced at her and took his right hand off the wheel. Silently, the four of them rolled toward La Push, toward the endless ocean where the sun had vanished hours and hours ago. Toward the river mouth. Toward the mess and the magic. Jacob felt Embry in his mind. There were no words at this distance, only a feeling, heavy like a stone. He squeezed Bella's hand and the four of them rolled west, holding on tight.

* * *

 **Questions:**

1\. What might depend on Charlie's knowledge?

2\. Did Bella give Emily good advice? Did she do it in a good way? And is Emily's freak out warranted, or does it make you think less of her?

3\. Is Jacob being irresponsible? If so, is that okay? And do you like to read his thoughts when he's with the pack, or with Bella? Or should the narration stay out of his head, like in _Bella's Guitar_ that showed only B's thoughts?

4\. What should the pack do about Riley?

5\. What do you think of some of the pack's challenges and quirks: Paul's mental probing and lashing out; Embry and Jake's connection; Quil's shaky start; Jared's calm; Sam's stress….

6\. Favorite bits? Funny bits?

7\. Who's the Management?

I'd love to hear your thoughts on any or all of these questions. Thank you all! Please let me know what you think. I am crossing my fingers, hoping you'll respond! Previews to reviewers? I'll try my best! My children stink less, so we are catching up on baths. :-)


	12. Chapter 12 Five Alphas

Chapter Twelve

 **"Five Alphas"**

Something was going to change tonight. Something big. Bella could feel it as Charlie turned into Billy's driveway, slowly pulling up next to the house as gravel popped under the tires. The lights were on. Charlie, Jake, Bella, and Joy got out of the cruiser and stood in the driveway. The night was cold; Bella hugged her arms. A moment later, a large, black, shiny pickup truck pulled in beside them. Then an old, blue Toyota Tercel. A woman Bella had never seen before came walking up the driveway, flashlight in hand, wearing rubber boots and a green raincoat. She looked about Charlie's age and wore her strait black hair parted on the side. Kim walked beside her. The door of the pickup truck opened and Emily slid out of the driver's seat, a shopping bag over her shoulder, and opened the back door of the extended cab to help Ellen Uley exit. Sam's mother Allison and grandmother Clara climbed out on the other side. Next, Emily helped Claire climb out of the truck. Embry's mother got out of the blue car. Then three boys came walking across the field, utterly silent, their faces solemn and tense: Sam, Embry, and Jared. Quil and Paul were nowhere to be seen. Maybe still in the woods, thought Bella. Or with Riley. Emily stood looking at Charlie, and he clapped his hand on her shoulder and gestured toward the house. Side by side, those two ascended the porch ramp.

Bella held Jacob's hand. The door swung open, seemingly of its own accord, like something that would happen in a scary movie, but no, when Bella followed Charlie up the ramp, she saw that Harry had opened it. The crowd filed in, no one speaking, and Charlie took a seat at the foot of Billy's table. Billy sat at the head. Old Quil on his left. Harry on his right. Emily sat down on Charlie's right, and Bella saw him give her hand a squeeze under the table. At Charlie's left side, Joy preferred to stand.

"Yes?" Billy said. The word was said in the tone of voice that friendly shopkeepers use to say, "May I help you?", but Billy's expression revealed nothing friendly. His expression revealed nothing at all, and Bella felt that his tone veiled an adamantine resolve to be the opposite of helpful. Whatever this meeting was about, Billy had already decided, before anyone could speak, and the answer was the opposite of his "Yes?"

Charlie, however, seemed to radiate his own form of determination. Bella could see it in his stillness.

Old Quil was also still. He had his war jacket on—Bella thought of his Korean War veteran's jacket that way—and he sat stiffly, his walking stick between his knees and his hands resting on top of it, stacked. The lines in his face made his frown look permanent.

It was funny, Bella thought, how adults could argue without saying anything.

The clock on the wall said half past ten. Billy's table was cleared, no more of the stacks of dirty dishes Bella had noticed last week. The dining area linoleum floor had been swept and the living room's brown carpet had been vacuumed—proof, Bella thought, that Jacob had been home more. In the living room, the television was tuned to a news program, the neatly-suited, white-lady anchor seriously delivering tidings of a world that seemed far, far away. Sam glanced at Jared, who glanced at Embry, who turned it off. It caused Billy to glance at Sam and Jacob to glance at his father.

 _Okay,_ thought Bella, _I take it back. All of them can fight without saying anything._

Like she had done for the boys in the forest, Emily called the meeting to order, saying quietly, "Today I did the laundry."

Billy surveyed the group impassively as Harry put a hand over his heart and took a deep breath.

"I did the laundry and tried to sew this shirt." Emily pulled a white T-shirt from her bag and lay it on the scratched, wooden table as delicately as if it were a maimed butterfly. "But I only had green thread and I don't know how to sew. Not really." An uneven line of puckered stitches held one arm of the shirt together. "It's Jared's."

The woman whom Bella guessed was Kim's mother looked at Kim, and Kim squeezed her eyes shut and lowered her head.

"Also I made these muffins," said Emily. "But I made some mistakes." A charred lump in a clear plastic bag was placed beside the shirt. "And I wrote this." She placed three sheets of paper on the table, a double-spaced essay. "Irony in _A Midsummer Night's Dream,_ " read the title. She had typed Paul Lahote's name on it. "But I made some mistakes on purpose. And I got these back." She lay a dozen more papers on the table, with other boys' names on them, papers in all subjects, geometry and algebra problem sets, physics lab reports, and more essays for history, literature, and language classes. The grades ranged from A- to D. "It's hard to remember which subjects I should get the most typical grades in for each person."

Tiffany Call's shoulders twitched.

If Emily were waiting for the elders to say something, it looked like she'd have to wait a long time. Her face was pale as she reached into her bag again for a large envelope and shook its contents onto the table: dozens of gently curling white papers. A few larger papers, folded. In the dim light from the plastic chandelier, the papers looked slightly yellow.

"These are the… The expenses."

Sam opened his mouth, then shut it again when Billy directed his gaze his way.

"It's, um. It's groceries. From the Thriftway. I can get the damaged cans sometimes. They know me there. Sometimes they give me carrots that get limp, or bruised apples. Stuff they'd have to throw away. I try to economize. But the boys, they want a lot of meat. It's expensive."

Silence.

"And here's my tuition deposit. From Peninsula College. I was going to go full time so I could get the Pell grant, and I got all my classes on Tuesdays and Thursdays so I'd only have to drive from Neah Bay twice a week. Save my mom gas."

"Babe," began Sam, but a glance from Billy made him swallow his words.

"So I lost this," continued Emily. "Partial refund. Had to give it back to the Makah council. I owe them the balance. And here," she said, her long fingers fluttering through the papers, "here's some math I did. It's about a hundred and eighty to feed them each week. I know they get meals at their houses, too, but they're with us a lot—"

"Sam," said Alison Uley, "I have tried to stay out of your business, but now's the time to tell us what's really going on here."

Clenching his jaw, Sam looked out the window. His face was red.

"I'm spending what I'd saved for college," said Emily. "I worked summers in the Makah Welcome Center for three years. And I'm really trying to be as cheap—as economical—as I can. Ellen showed me how to gut a fish. I pulled in a good steelhead two days ago, about fifteen pounds. I'd fish more, but I can't fold laundry in Sam's boat."

If that was meant to be a joke, nobody found it funny. The women in the room began to radiate an uncertain, indignant solidarity, their bodies slightly bending toward Emily like a flower bends toward the sun. "Child," said Clara Uley, "why are you doing this?" When Emily didn't reply, Clara said, "God damn it, Billy, why is she doing this?" Embry moved to stand with his mother, slightly in front of her, between her and Billy. Tiffany's thin face went stony as a black emotion began to swirl through the dining room, a force, a feeling that stirred Bella's nerves and made her squeeze Jacob's hand. Emily's breath hitched, and Bella found herself tearing up. What was happening? When she saw that Emily was tearing up, too, Bella blinked hard, willing herself to stop her tears.

Emily blinked hard, too, but she took a deep breath and struggled on. "And Claire needs me." The edges of her voice were rough as the three-year-old squirmed onto her lap. "Mommy," said Claire. So young and small. Unable to choose not to cry, hiding her face under Emily's arm. "My sister needs me," said Emily. "My sister and my niece and my mother and my three-month-old nephew _need_ me." When the men on Billy's end of the table stared back at her and Old Quil's nostrils flared, Emily stood up, lifting Claire onto her hip. "You try it. You have a baby. Let it tear your body, let it suck its life from you night and day." There was fury in her voice and she did not let her tears spill. "Why don't you ship your spouse to Afghanistan and pray he doesn't die every time he goes looking for IED's? Yeah. His job is not to avoid those; he's supposed to find them and defuse or destroy them. My sister needs me and I cannot stay here _every day._ "

The only things that moved after that were Sam, putting his arms around Emily and Claire from behind and laying his forehead on her neck, Claire sucking in a deep, shuddering breath, and Charlie's left eyebrow.

Jacob stood stiffly, his eyes on his father. After a long moment, Billy said, very quietly, "Sam, I expected more from you."

Sam said nothing. Jacob could feel it then. The chokehold Billy had on Sam's throat.

"Out," said Billy quietly. "All but you, Sam. And Jacob. You two may stay."

Bella knew to preserve Jacob's dignity by turning silently and walking out with her head up.

The others filed outside as well. In the driveway, she felt like she could finally breathe, and the night air cooled her cheeks as a wave of repressed emotion washed over her, all the sorrow, compassion, anger, and disgust she had felt standing in the house. Disgust and anger even at the way everyone turned and left, just because Billy said so. The adult women looked at one another, hands over their hearts or at the base of their necks, and struggled to voice what they felt. Kim hugged her mother while Jared stood by, his hands in his pockets. Surely he knew her mother hated him. Embry's mother stood with her arms folded, hugging herself like Bella to keep warm, saying nothing. Like her son, she was not a person to show her cards.

And there they stood. Just staring at one another. Claire slipped her hand into Embry's and pressed her face against his knee. That's when Bella noticed that Emily had not come outside. Nor had Joy, Charlie, or Ellen Uley.

Jared said, "There's a space heater in the garage."

Once, when Bella was twelve, she'd spent an anxious afternoon in a hospital waiting room. Renee was having a small tumor removed from her breast. It was benign. The word _benign_ was a new one for Bella; the whole tumor experience expanded her vocabulary with words and phrases like benign, fibrous mass, general anesthesia, and suture. She had spent the afternoon in the waiting room with Deborah, Renee's girlfriend at the time. Bella had liked Deborah. Deborah was a solid, practical woman who kept her feet on the ground and her head out of the clouds. She wore jeans and loud, brightly patterned, boxy blouses. In the waiting room, Deborah sat beside Bella with her knees apart, her forearms on her knees, and her hands hanging loosely between them. She frequently puffed out her cheeks with a sigh. And she had given Bella a copy of _The Black Stallion_ to read. It had been her own, she said, when she was a girl. Bella lost herself on a sandy island with a wiry boy and a skittish, exquisite horse. Before she knew it, a nurse emerged to say that the surgery had gone smoothly and Renee was waking up. Deborah told Bella she had been a brave girl.

At the time, she'd wondered why. Now it seemed that not crumpling under her anxiety was a form of bravery. She followed everyone into the garage and sat quietly on the old blue minivan seat.

Jared turned the space heater on high and flipped on the florescent light over the tool bench on the back wall. He also hung the light bulb Jake used to work on the Rabbit, the one in an orange wire cage on a long, orange cord, from a rafter, where it spun slowly, casting a grid of shadows.

With the car in the middle of the garage, their group was divided. Jared and Embry leaned against a wall, offering overturned buckets as seats for the adults. A hard stare from Jared made Bella stand and offer the minivan seat to Sam's grandmother. And when they were all settled, the boys and Claire were on the other side of the car from Bella, Clara, Allison, Tiffany, Kim, and her mother. There was a knock on the door, and Jared opened it to admit a middle-aged man and woman, the man overweight, wearing an olive green fleece jacket, unzipped, and the woman with her hair in a ponytail and her tennis shoes and the hem of her yoga pants muddy: Jared's parents. They eyed the crowd and squeezed inside.

"Some party," said Jared's dad.

Bella felt Jared's mom glance at her. Not in an unkind way. But she noticed the glance enough to make her feel different. Not Quileute. That was a good thing, she was soon to discover.

The boys leaned on the wall that was closest to the driveway and the house. They kept their eyes closed. Every now and then they would grimace or cringe. Embry looked bleak. Jared, resigned. "What is—" said his mother, but Jared said, "Shh," and Bella felt a ripple of confusion and fear pass through the others. _Yeah…._ she thought. _These people aren't stupid._ They watched the boys' faces for a long time, and after a while, Embry began to smile.

"There is so much shit flying around in there," he whispered.

Jared looked a little brighter.

"Alpha war," whispered Embry. "Or Alphas."

Bella could feel the questions bubbling up in their audience, but no one interrupted.

"Such a mess," said Jared.

Embry snorted once and whispered, "Four!" He raised his eyebrows and looked at Bella, biting his lip against laughter.

"Five," said Jared.

"Five? I think four," said Embry. "Are you counting Em?"

Jared sighed.

The boys closed their eyes again. Drowsy, Claire sat down on the dusty, concrete floor and leaned her face against Embry's calf, pulling her knees up and tucking them inside the cardigan sweater. At last Embry said, "He's gonna step up."

"Tell him to say it."

Embry closed his eyes again. "He's scared."

Kim's mother spoke out, angry questions, and the boys shushed her, too. Bella gave her an apologetic smile.

"Tell him to say it," repeated Jared.

When Embry held out his hand to Bella, somehow she knew that Jake needed her. She squeezed his hand and leaned on the wall beside him, wishing she could hear, too.

"Oh!" shouted Jared. It was the kind of exclamation that some people follow with, "Oh, snap!" or "Oh, no, they didn't!" His eyes were bright. He looked at Embry with his eyebrows raised, and Embry said, "Five?"

Jared nodded.

"Five. Holy shit."

His mother gave a small cough.

"Sorry."

"I think it's like a scale," Jared said. "Get 'em all on one side."

"Trying." He squeezed her hand again. _You can do it,_ he mouthed to Bella.

 _What?_ she replied.

 _You… Can…._

"You can do it?"

Shaking his head, Jared pressed his palm to his forehead, and Embry gestured with the hand that wasn't holding Bella's, making a fist and quickly swinging it from his side to the middle of his body. _Enthusiasm,_ he seemed to say.

"You can do it."

Jared looked at Kim, and she smiled as she joined Bella in repeating those words.

" _Who_ can do it?" said Clara.

"Jake," said the boys.

"Do what?"

"You can do it!" said Bella and Kim, even though Bella wasn't completely sure what this meant. There was so much Jake hadn't told her yet. How the change in forms worked. How it felt to run, to smell, to see as a wolf. How it felt to have so many voices in his head. How well they could hear. She was almost positive the boys were listening to the conversation in the house. They breathed deeply, their chests expanding visibly beneath their clothes that didn't fit right anymore, and let their heads fall back against the thin, planked wall.

"Jake can do it," said Jared's father. When the women looked at him, his placid shrug mirrored his son's. "Whatever it is, he can probably do it. Go, Jake," he said. "You can do it."

"Do _what?"_ said Jared's mom.

"Just join in," said Jared.

It was exciting! thought Bella. Like cheering at a football game, except you couldn't see the players. The garage was warming up, the light bulb above the car had stopped spinning, and Embry was almost laughing. "This is probably a good idea," she said to the adults.

Jared rolled his eyes. "It is," he assured them.

"Will this get us some answers?" said Allison wearily. She was still dressed in the clothes she'd worn to work at Evergreen State Savings, a maroon three-quarter sleeve sweater, a strand of small, yellow beads, black slacks, and uncomfortable-looking, low-heeled black shoes. Bella wondered why she hadn't changed out of her work clothes earlier. Probably Allison was wondering that, too.

"Very likely," replied Jared.

"You can do it," she said.

Pretty soon the whole barn was tingling with energy. "You! Can! Do! It!"

"I can do it!" said Claire, waking up, hugging Embry's knee. She brushed her black bangs out of her eyes. "I can! I can!"

No one corrected her. Bella looked at the boys with a question on her lips, and Embry mouthed, _Alpha!_

Of course! Now she understood. She squeezed his hand so hard! "Jake, you can do it!"

"Billy is so pissed," said Embry as the crowd kept going.

"I thought he wanted this," said Jared.

" _Sam_ does," was the reply. Then he held up his hand for silence. The boys looked at one another. They cocked their heads.

"Hmm," they said. And then Jared added, "Crap."

"No, no," said Embry. "This is better. Better, right?"

"I guess. Maybe."

"Definitely."

 _Well?_ everyone seemed to be thinking. Most of the adults looked almost uncertain and anxious again, except for Jared's father, who put an arm around his wife's shoulders and his hand in his pocket. He pursed his lips as if to whistle, then thought better of it.

Bella envied him his calm. Inside, she was tingling with curiosity and excitement. Jake was supposed to become the Alpha? The group's leader? Wow! He hadn't mentioned this. Is that what had happened in the house? Was this related to becoming the Chief, like Billy, one day? Was becoming the leader of the wolves an inherited thing? And if so, who had stepped down? Sam?

Or, she thought with a chill, Billy?

Embry's hand was sweaty. Bella let go and wiped her palm on her jeans as the boys held a quick conference, in barely audible whispers, frustration and confusion and hope flickering over their faces. Hope won.

"We have something to tell you," began Embry. He and Jared looked at one another, their cheeks pink. Jared took a deep breathe and gave a deeper sigh. He puffed his cheeks out. Embry slugged his shoulder in an encouraging way, and Jared slugged him back. Holding the back of his hand to his nose, Jared tried to hide a smile, and Embry shook his hands as if they were wet, flinging off drops of water. "I don't know where to start."

The mothers looked at each other. Jared's father said, "You two boys are in love?" and Jared's mother smacked his arm. "Not the time for jokes."

The boys turned pinker. Bella heard Jared whisper, "Maybe we should say yes and run away together. It would be so much easier."

The garage had begun to feel stuffy, so Jared turned off the heater and cracked open a door. The spring peepers had stopped in the silence of the deep night. Embry listened and listened to the darkness, to whatever he could hear from the house.

"Permission to launch?" said Jared.

"Yes. No. Three yes. One not sure. One no. A hard no."

"He's still got his finger in the pie? Tell Jake to push harder."

A pause. And then, "Jake says, find the loophole."

And _that_ was where Bella came in. Later, Embry would call her their Ringer. Jared would call her their Loophole, and Embry would say he'd better forget that nickname before Paul heard it because part of that word was "hole." Later, Jake would tell her once again that she was brave. She would bury her face between his arm and his ribs as he told her this, the next day, standing on her porch, hugging her. He would tell her on the beach, and at the next pack meeting, and when they drove in her truck. _You think you're not special,_ he would say to her later. _Why do you think that? Bella, you are. You are._

There was a lot she had yet to learn about being a wolf. One thing was Orders. Alphas gave Orders, and Orders were obeyed whether the wolves wanted to or not. That night in the garage, Jared and Embry were so nervous, giddy with relief yet worried that their parents might be horrified or appalled. They tried many times to tell their story, yet the words would not come out because the weight of Billy's and Sam's commands stopped their throats. It was painful, Bella could see. Embry fought the Order until tears came to his eyes, until his mother's eyes became mirrors. Next, Kim tried, but the extended effect made her hesitant and inarticulate, if not truly mute. "I don't understand," said her mother. "Kimmy, what's wrong?" The adults, too, though not connected to the pack as closely as Kim, were unable to penetrate the veil. It was as if the Alphas' commands had moved backward through their sons' blood, through the spiderweb of relationships within the tribe, through the tiny, fibrous roots of their spirits that bound them to the land that held their loved ones, long gone, interred on the hill east of the village, or, longer gone, on Akalat offshore.

Perhaps this was why the secret had always remained intact. Not even Tiffany, with no Quileute blood, could form a question that made sense. The Order was so powerful that even the disarray in leadership could not loosen its hold. And the Order was ancient, too, Ancient with a capital A, the oldest, strongest, purest. The Order was part of them, and they were the Order, and to destroy the Order was to destroy oneself. A death for the life of the secret. Later, Jacob would tell her that Embry was scared when he realized this. He felt trapped. Jacob would say that Jared gave up almost at once, but that Embry struggled till he felt sick and his mother was frightened, too. And later, Jacob would tell her how he'd pulled his attention from the struggle in the house to lift his brother up.

"Jake says it has to be you," whispered Embry. He set her on top of the Rabbit, and she was scared, but she knew what she had do to. Everyone was looking at her. Taking a deep breath, she began, "Do you believe in magic?"

* * *

The following day, Wednesday, Bella felt exhausted. She could only imagine that everyone else at the meeting last night felt the same, or worse. On top of Jake's car, she'd felt like a flame on a hill. Like a beacon sailors looked to for guidance. How could she, Bella Swan, guide anybody? But somehow she'd managed to answer most of their questions and to remind them of the legends like she had with Quil, and it worked. They seemed relieved. Then Jake had come out of the house shortly after midnight, kissed her cheek, and slipped into the woods.

The others came outside as well. Old Quil walked home alone while Joy stood trembling in Charlie's arms and he put his cheek on the top of her head. Bella looked away, embarrassed. Joy was probably crying, and it didn't seem characteristic. She might not want others to see this. Harry sat down heavily on the porch steps with his niece at his side. He put his arm around her shoulder as she spoke to him quietly. Sam sat down on Harry's other side, putting an arm around him as well. He looked worried and angry and tired. Only Ellen Uley looked pleased with what had happened. Sure, the others were glad to have answers, but they weren't happy. Ellen Uley looked fiercely delighted. Vindicated. Victorious. And strangely free. Maybe being three generations older than the current pack put her closer to the original Order, Bella would wonder later. But Jake would say nope. That was not the reason for her smile at all. Everyone came outside except Billy. Like a king in his keep beneath a sacked castle, he turned out the lights.

Then Embry led them all to the field behind the house. It had to be him, Bella knew, because he was the only one who could do this safely. He stilled his body. Even the wheeling stars seemed to hold still. Then, carefully, he let himself go.

No one will know what was in his mother's heart at that moment. She saw her son melt into silver. He shone like water in the air, transparent, then like old ice in the last days of February, dully translucent. His clothes fell away. Translucence darkened, brightened again in a silver opacity that spat and flashed at the edges like a child's sparkler on the fourth of July. The air moved, lifting the hair on Bella's neck, and her ears thrummed as the silver tightened, like a fist, and opened again and spread like a cloud. Bella felt a heaviness in her chest and a lump in her throat. For a moment he seemed lost. Jared took a step toward the place where he'd been, and then the silvery gray, lanky wolf was there, its head lowered in submission. He was thinner than when Bella had seen him before. No one will know if Tiffany heard the others' gasps. Silent as the wolf, she crossed the grass and put her arms around her son's neck. Her shagged hair riffled like his fur.

Nobody screamed; nobody fainted. But Kim's mother slapped Jared across the mouth.

* * *

So here she was, Wednesday afternoon, and Bella once again found herself drifting through her school day, struggling to remain focused on ordinary things like the periodic table, Spanish pronouns, and the bowling tournament in gym class. Could there be anything more pointless? Her boyfriend was transformed into a wolf. Her father knew everything now. Her friend Riley was a vampire, though he didn't understand that yet, and had probably been through something so horrible during the change that a raging dream was all he could imagine to account for it. And her mother had sent her a greeting card in the mail.

"Thinking of you…" it read. Today was March 11, so this was probably, she thought, a Valentine's Day card that had been on sale. There were pink hearts and two pink hedgehogs sitting nose to nose, smiling at one another. "Bella," Renee had written, "I love you so much. I miss you. I would like to start over." Start over? What did that mean? And what was she supposed to do or say about it? Sometimes she felt as if she had a trashcan in her mind. Depending on her mood, it was either bottomless or overflowing. Bella imagined putting her mother's card in that trashcan and pressing hard on the lid while all kinds of other things threatened to spill out. _Shut up,_ she told the trashcan. _You take this card and shut the heck up._ She imagined smashing the lid into place.

The clatter of bowling pins, echoing in the gym, brought her mind back to class. Angela had rolled another strike. Bella tried to refocus her attention as she held up her hand for a high five. Bouncing on her toes, Angela palmed her ball as she waited for Mike and Cody to reset the pins. Somebody had to do it, and Coach Clapp had divided the class to perform this favor for one another. One cool thing about rolling a strike, thought Bella, was that you got another turn. Angela was so stinking good at this that it was a pleasure to watch her. Her tall, slim frame moved fluidly, and the way she swung her right leg back and bent her left knee reminded Bella of a curtsy, a beautiful, graceful gesture that a ballet dancer might make at the end of Swan Lake or something grand like that. _I must look more like a Swan Puddle_ , she thought. _Bella Swan Puddle. Bella Damp Paper Towel._ She sighed. When it was Mike and Cody's turn to bowl, she and Angela crossed to the other side of the room.

"Why do you like him?" whispered Bella.

Angela had her eye on Cody. He didn't pause, check his feet, or count his steps—his method was the opposite of Angela's. He just walked to the end of the lane and rolled the ball. Whatever, said his posture. Yet he rolled a lot of strikes, too.

"Huh?" said Angela.

Bella had been shushed so many times on this topic by a blushing Angela that she just glanced at Cody, then shrugged her shoulders: _Why?_

"Why not?" was the whispered reply.

Bella had to shrug again, but her romance detector was waking up, and the needle was swinging toward the "bad idea" indicator that characterized most of Charlie's decisions lately. She reminded herself that Joy was a basically good person who was going through a lot right now. Her head knew this, though her heart still had misgivings. _Am I worried that Cody will take Angela away from me? Like Joy and Charlie?_ No. No, of course not.

She sighed. Cody bowled yet another strike. "Woo!" said Angela, supportively, which made him look at her. He smiled a little, then high-fived Mike and waited for them to reset the pins. His grace was different from Angela's. Hers was studied and tightly disciplined. His was careless and innate. And irreverent. He stood with his back to the girls, bent at the waist, and rolled the ball between his legs. As he watched it spin down the lane, he remained in that position, his fair skin turning pink, his red curls looking longer as they stood up on his head—in an upside-down way. The ball knocked all the pins over again, causing Bella to roll her eyes (some people have all the luck.), Angela and Mike to laugh, and Coach Clapp to say, "Shannon!" in a warning tone. But Cody Shannon was on the basketball team, so he just grinned and pretended to look sheepish.

In the locker room, Angela gave Bella her reasons: "Because he's cute and he's here."

"What about Quil?"

"Also cute. But not here. Are you rooting for Quil?"

"I don't know." Bella took off her tennis shoes. "Maybe like, be friends with him first."

"Takes too long," said Angela, tidily folding her white T-shirt and green shorts.

Bella felt confused. She looked at the bench, new, green, and plastic. In the old locker room, where they'd had their first heart-to-heart talk, the bench had been made of wood and scratched with initials, plus signs between them, and hearts around them.

"We can't all have a thing like you and Jake," whispered Angela. "You guys are like— You know. It's really, really special."

"Geez, Ange, don't cry."

"I'm not," said Angela. "I just feel like having a boyfriend, so I'm going to get one."

"Well, okay."

"I have known this whole town since I was in kindergarten. All these guys. Grew up with them. Most are turds. He's not. Mike's not. Eric Yorkie, he's okay, but he's kind of ew. There are a few other non-turds here, but Cody's one of the cutest."

 _Cute if you like pale ginger kids,_ she thought.

"And Quil seems fun, but he's not interested in me, I guess."

"Well—"

"Plus there's the whole 'not in your league' thing." The girls picked up their backpacks and headed into the hall as Angela explained this. "I'm in the Nerdy League. Like you."

Bella wasn't sure she liked that label. For either of them. "Hey," she began, but Angela ignored her.

"You, me, Nerds. Him, Jock."

"Aren't those things not supposed to go together?"

"Yes, but he's also a C student—"

"This is appealing?"

"—who hasn't had a serious girlfriend before—"

"How do you know this?"

"—kindergarten, remember?—and he's not one of Lauren's exes, which is a deal-breaker for me, which limits the pool—"

"The pool?"

"—and so it's either him or Mike—"

"Mike?"

"Also not a turd. Keep up. But he has Jess, plus he's Mike."

"Why are we talking about Mike?"

"We're not. Ew." The girls had reached their lockers. Angela swung open the beige metal door, put her gym clothes neatly on her shelf, and reached for her history book. When she shut the door again, Mike was standing on the other side of it, his face pink, his blue eyes wary.

"Why am I so 'ew'?" he demanded.

Angela was nonplussed. "Because." She sailed into Mrs. Kranz's classroom with Bella at her heels. Her long dark hair swished dramatically as she tossed it over her shoulder. At the whiteboard, Mrs. Kranz was drawing battle front lines in red and blue dry-erase markers over a projected image of Europe. Angela took a seat in the front row. As Bella sank uncertainly into the chair behind her, she spun around with another toss of her hair. "I've done the math, made a chart—"

"A chart?"

"—and calculated the social groups as being minimally impacted by any negative eventualities due to limited overlap."

 _"What?"_

"Just kidding. But I've thought about this, and he's the best choice."

Mrs. Kranz asked for the class's attention, and Angela turned around. Bella bent over her yellow notebook and tried to sketch the map on the whiteboard. A paper wad (dry, thank goodness) hit her shoulder, and she glanced behind her.

"What the heck is she talking about?" hissed Mike.

Bella pretended not to know. A moment later, another paper wad hit her.

"Page three forty-seven," hissed Mike. "You don't have to draw that."

"Thanks," she whispered. Her map looked terrible anyway. Just a blob with wavy lines and uncertain arrows. It might as well be a map to love. Then again, she thought, it might be a map of her journey to love. It had taken a long time, a white sock, a night of stargazing, and a lot of other stuff (including, she grimaced, a dead deer by the side of the highway) to help her open her heart. Perhaps for normal people, the map to love was more tidy. Maybe it looked like a chart or a Venn diagram with limited social group overlap. But she wasn't sure. Her own way was definitely not normal, but could love really be so formulaic as Angela had calculated? And for pizza's sake, should the word "calculated" ever appear in the same sentence as the word "love"?

Maybe this was why the needle on her romance detector was swinging toward "bad idea."

* * *

After school, Bella trailed Angela to Olympic Acres to visit Vera and Albertine. She hadn't been there since the day after she'd been sprayed by skunks. As she walked down the hall to Vera's room, a couple ladies winked at her and pretended to hold their noses. _Ha ha ha,_ she thought. _Very funny._ But she gave them a little wave as she passed. As uncomfortable as it had felt to be the center of attention that evening, it was kind of nice to know that she was recognized here as Vera's girl. Vera's frequent visitor.

Suddenly she realized that she must be Vera's only visitor.

That was a lot of responsibility.

In the old ladies' room, Angela sat beside Albertine and admired her latest creation, a large, beautiful, heavy, mauve afghan. It was edged in lace, and the knitted pattern in the main part looked like seashells. "It's for you, Vera," said Albertine, as if this were a big surprise. She lifted her eyebrows, her face alight, waiting for Vera's reaction. Anyone could tell that she knew Vera wasn't surprised a bit, but the fun lay in pretending to be surprised.

"Oh, goody," croaked Vera.

"Can you hand this to Vera, sweetie?" said Albertine, working the last tail of yarn into the pattern and passing the afghan to Bella. It was thick and warm. Bella accepted the weighty thing and stood beside Vera's bed with her arms outstretched.

"Here."

Vera was sitting upright, the mattress having been raised to an almost ninety degree angle. She looked at Bella with her milky blue eyes as if she expected better service than this, so Bella poured the afghan onto the bed and walked from one side to the other, spreading it out and smoothing it over the five or six afghans that were already there. Vera's knees and feet made little mounds beneath them.

"Are you warmer?" asked Albertine.

"Eh," Vera said with a shrug.

"She's always cold," said Albertine.

"We remember," said Angela. "Hey, Vera, would you like me to knit you a hat? I made Bella's hat."

Yes, she had. Bella took off her red, lumpy hat and handed it to Vera as an example of Angela's skill. Vera squinted at it and said, "Hrrmm," which the girls could interpret as they wished. Angela took this as affirmative and asked Albertine if she had any mauve yarn left, and while Albertine found that and a knitting book with a hat pattern, the girls took off their coats. Bella put hers on a chair by the dinette set where Vera's crystal animals sparkled on the table under their glass dome. It made Bella feel strange to look at them. A little sad, a little angry, and a little numb.

With effort, she pulled her gaze away and dug her yellow notebook out of her backpack. Emily had returned it to her. The last time she'd seen it, it had been full of thawing meat and lying in Edward's meadow, where she'd flung it at Laurent, trying to distract him from her friends. Last night, Emily returned it washed and smelling only a little bit like hamburger. Almost as good as new. Her grandmother's photograph, however, was badly damaged. She had taken it with her in case the wolf monster could see into her heart. Now she opened her notebook. She had taped what was left of the photo to the inside cover.

Mrs. Kranz had assigned another essay. The topic was gratitude and regrets. When looking back on their lives, for what were the seniors most thankful? And what regrets did they have; what might they have done differently? Bella had stayed after class. "Yes?" said the teacher. "My partner," Bella said. "She, um… Well…" Mrs. Kranz's listened as Bella described, as tactfully as she could, a life that was perhaps full of regrets and not much to be thankful for. "Oh," said Mrs. Kranz. "Hmm. I remember this from your other essay. Then this topic should be easy for you, right?" Well, yes, Bella said, but— It was hard to explain, but she felt as if— "You know what this is called, Bella?" said the teacher. "Tact. Not a lot of young people have this. I'm proud of you for being so thoughtful." She asked Bella to write instead about what advice Vera would give to today's teens. "Thank you," Bella had said.

Albertine got Angela started on the hat pattern, then told her to take it home. She was eager to talk about her life, so Angela got out her own notebook. As they began their discussion, Vera looked at Bella.

"Girl," she croaked.

"Bella," Bella reminded her.

"Bella girl."

Close enough. Bella pulled a chair close to Vera's bed. "What advice would you give—" she began, but Vera had already heard Angela's questions.

"Regrets," said Vera. "How much paper do you have?"

"A lot?"

"A lot. Put that down. 'A lot.'"

"'A lot' of paper?"

"Regrets," said Vera.

"A lot."

"Yes. And gratitude?"

"Yes?" said Bella.

"Put, 'Not a lot.'"

Bella frowned at her paper. That made exactly five words for her essay. _Whhhhirrr_ went the mechanism of Vera's bed as she held the button to lower the mattress. "Wait," Bella said. "Also, what advice would you give to teens today?"

 _"Call of the Wild?"_

"What?"

"Read to me."

 _How about,_ _"Read to me, please?"_ thought Bella. She looked in her backpack. "I don't have it with me. Sorry."

"Read me something else."

All she had was her history book. Angela and Albertine were chattering away about thankfulness for grandchildren and all the cute things they did. This is so not fair, thought Bella. She opened her book. "'During the Second World War, American involvement in the—"

"Read me something else."

There was nothing else. Nothing but the yellowing paperback romance novels on Albertine's sagging wicker bookcase. Bella pursued the selection. Most had pictures of a man and woman on the cover, caught in some torrid yet agonized embrace, their clothes billowing in an imaginary wind, very nearly exposing body parts that ought not to be on the cover of a book kids might see. Many seemed to be set in some long gone century and depicted a rarified lifestyle. Starving peasants? No. Knights on horseback. Sailors with scurvy and syphilis? No. Pirate lords with puffy white shirts. The lady often wore a long dress with a tight corset and a full skirt, and the skirt had a waist-high slit that exposed one long, golden thigh. Bella was pretty sure this was not a historically correct costume choice. Would characters in Jane Austen novels have had a waist-high rip in their empire waist muslin gowns? Goodness, no.

"Pick something with a cowboy," said Vera.

"Oh, yes," said Albertine. "A cowboy."

Angela said, "What about our interview?" but Albertine didn't hear her. She was leaning into the hallway, hollering for June and Alma to come hear Bella read a cowboy romance.

"I'll get Phyllis," Bella heard one of them say. "Her cataracts are worse than mine."

Soon four half-blind lonely ladies—and Albertine, who could see just fine—were crowded into the room to hear Bella read aloud from _Lasso My Heart._ The rearing stallion on the cover looked just as muscled and gleaming with sweat as the man, and Bella hoped it wouldn't appear in any intimate scenes. "'He could break the wildest mustang,'" she began, "'but could he tame the heart of the rancher's sassy daughter… without breaking her wild spirit?'"

Angela stifled a laugh.

Half an hour later, Bella was dying for drink of water for her dry throat and blushing so hard she was perspiring. The horse did appear in the steamy scenes, sometimes watching a literal roll in the hay, and sometimes galloping with the lovers on its back. "Read that again," said one of the ladies. "About the pounding of the hooves and the motion of the animal's slick, bare back."

"No," frowned Bella. "I can't read any more; I need a drink of water."

They hurried to get her one.

So Bella read to them until dinner time, five chapters of torrid encounters and turgid flesh. The word choices seemed to follow a pattern of sexy euphemisms, replacing words like "nipple" with "sensitive peak" and "breast" with "glowing mound." The words for the male body were equally elaborate yet indirect. "Member." "Shaft." _Blurgh._ This was not like what she wanted to imagine for herself. Was this what sex was really like? There were times when Angela put her elbows on her knees and her face in her hands. Laughing? wondered Bella. Cringing? Blushing? Her ears were certainly pink. By the end of the fifth chapter, Bella was feeling more used than embarrassed.

"I'm done," she said. "This horse thing is too much."

"Oh, yeah," said June. "I've read this before. You should probably quit now."

"Awwww!" said the other ladies. "No!"

Thank goodness it was dinner time. As they were leaving, the girls heading to the parking lot and the ladies to the dining room, Vera lay a gnarled, claw-like hand on Bella's sleeve.

"Advice," she croaked. "Treat books nicely. Don't chew gum. Take your secrets to your grave."

She looked pleased with herself. She patted Bella's arm, and Bella stared at her wrinkly hand, thinking that Vera must be in an especially good mood. When she shuffled away, Bella stood there puzzling over the pride Vera took in her secrets. Secrets about You-Know-Who. Secrets about I-Know-Who. Secrets that she herself used to take pride in.

She also thought about secrets she kept for Renee. The pot-smoking. The times she called in sick to work when she wasn't sick, just too loopy to drive. The time their electricity was shut off not because they couldn't afford the bill, but because Renee just forgot. She forgot for a few months in a row while envelopes with red letters on them accumulated on the kitchen table. "Oops!" she had said on the morning when they realized it was not a coincidence that all their light bulbs had stopped working at once.

Bella was good at keeping secrets. Cooking, cleaning, keeping secrets. But also listening and being brave. Jacob had noticed those things. She wondered if Vera had ever had a chance to be good at something else besides secrets, book repair, and not chewing gum.

Maybe she should bring Vera some gum.

* * *

Jacob was waiting on her front porch swing when she got home, a book and a sheet of binder paper on his lap, hurrying through Algebra problems. "Hang on," he said as he worked through the last one. Then he stood up to hug her, sighing, "Oh, Bells. I got the night off."

As usual, he put his nose in her hair. She felt his warm breath on her scalp; shivers ran through her as he snuffled along her temples, her ears, and her neck as she tried not to squirm. "Don't laugh," he said. "I love this." "It tickles," she explained. She raised her shoulders to protect her neck, but he squirmed past them, kissing her there, whispering, "Relax. Relax. Let me," and the feeling that rolled through her then was so, so different, and so much more wonderful, than any feeling that romance novel had inspired. She smiled, running her hands over his warm back, reaching up for his shoulder blades, for the close-cut hair on the back of his head. He hummed and walked her backward, step by little step, until she was pressed against the wall beside her front door and he was leaning against her. When she lifted her face, he kissed her lips, rubbed the side of his nose against hers, and nipped along her jaw. She did the same, and then he knew he had to stop pressing against her. He shuddered and stepped back, keeping his forehead touching hers.

"Can I come in?"

"Of course."

In the kitchen, Bella started making dinner. She wished she could sit on the couch and cuddle with Jacob, but Charlie would be home in an hour. Jake offered to help, which she appreciated because so many of her recipes centered around the meat that was no longer in her freezer. "How about pasta?" he said. "Can you make a cream sauce?" She could. She had a pint of heavy cream she had been planning to use for whipped cream on a cake or pie—she hadn't decided—but now she could use it for Alfredo sauce. Not hard to make. Jake steamed some broccoli, Bella boiled pasta, enough for Jake, too, and when it was all done, they still had half an hour. She put the lid on her saucepan and lay her head on Jake's chest; he put his arms around her and they held each other, swaying slightly.

"Couch?" he said after a moment. She nodded. He sat on one end of it, his arm around her, and she leaned against his side, tucking her feet beneath her.

"So…" she began, hoping he'd tell her what had happened in the house. "You're the Alpha now?"

"Yes," he said. His eyes twinkled. "And no."

Being the Alpha was a lot of responsibility, he explained. His friends could die if he made a stupid decision. He wasn't ready for this. All his life, his father had groomed him to be a leader, to listen, to put others' needs first. To radiate optimism. To be friendly.

"You are friendly," Bella said. "You're not faking it."

"Sure, sure. But I thought I was going to lead council meetings one day. Learn how to fund raise. Hold a raffle to build a new senior center, stuff like that."

"That sounds boring."

"It does not." He pretended to be horribly insulted, drawing back. "Shut up."

"No, I mean, compared to being chief of a pack of wolves."

"Oh," he said. Yes. Yes, it did.

Becoming the Alpha felt like a bait-and-switch form of trickery. Like, hey there, kid, wouldn't you like to motivate others to be their best? Sure. But he never dreamed he'd be doing it with magic animals. And the job wasn't just daunting in terms of responsibility; it was terribly hard. Who could manage Paul? How could he get Quil to believe in himself more? How could he get Embry to stop wallowing in shame? It was bringing everybody down.

"Shame?" said Bella.

He still felt horrible over the night he'd forced Jacob to change. Jacob skipped the part about Embry swimming out to sea, many times, but he did tell her a little about what was in their heads. Sam was grim and guilty, he said, often thinking about how he'd clawed Emily's face accidentally, how he'd broken Leah's heart, and how he'd give Leah a thousand trucks to smash if she could forgive him. Paul deflected attention from his own thoughts by prying into others', usually hunting something hurtful, and often something in Jake's head. Of them all, Jared seemed the most well-adjusted. Before he phased, he was just an ordinary person, no special interests or talents, no great sadness or loss troubling his heart. Now he was intuitively wolf. He fell into the animal as un-selfconsciously as an animal, if that made sense.

"No?" Bella said.

Jacob shifted to kick off his shoes and socks. He stretched his bare feet, curling his toes on Charlie's blue rug in front of the couch, and put them up on the coffee table, crossing his legs at the ankles. "Your feet are enormous," Bella blurted, leaning forward to lay her hand beside one. It was twice as big.

"Thanks," he said dryly. "I grew them myself."

What he meant was that Jared didn't have trouble, like the rest of them, with sorting out his identity in either form. He never seemed to say to himself, Now I'm a wolf, or Now I'm a person. He was just Jared. Or sometimes—more and more often—he was simply a spirit moving through the world in whatever body was convenient. A lot of his thoughts had no words. If the others looked through his eyes when they were out running, there was no narration. Just a blur of green. A warm feeling in his chest. The scent of dandelions high in the meadows. It wasn't even spring yet at that altitude; nothing was blooming in fields still covered with snow; but Jared's brain knew the scent of the flowers. How was that possible? Jared couldn't tell them, because when they asked, his wolf looked at them blankly, as if it didn't understand the question. As if it didn't understand the words—or didn't understand what words _were._ Quil's brain, by contrast, sounded like this:

"Hey, guys, hey, look over here. Look at this thing. Do you think it's a snake hole? Or a mouse hole? Do you think something lives in here? I'm 'onna put my nose in here."

The Quil-voice that Jacob used sounded excitable, almost cartoonish, and younger than the voice that came out of his normal self. "Does he really sound like that?" she said.

"Yeah. He's always digging shit up, roots and stones. He's really into his claws." Jacob curled his fingers fiercely and wrinkled his nose, pretending to dig in the cushions of Charlie's green couch. He found the remote control, which he tossed from hand to hand, flipping it up in the air and balancing it on his nose. He pretended to bite it. Then put it on the cushion and pawed it side to side. "I'm hoping this will pass. Hoping he'll get bored of his claws and pay attention."

Bella did not envy him this job.

But he'd take the excitability any day, said Jacob, because if he looked down another layer into Quil's mind, he saw a twelve-year-old boy staring at the sea with tears streaming down his face. He saw the boy curled in his bed. He saw him hurling rocks into the water until his shoulder ached. Saw him crying on his mother's lap. No one had known how badly he missed his father. And although no one gave him shit over this, not even Paul, Quil was angry that they knew.

Bella heard feet thump on the porch steps and the swishy sound of the mat as boots scratched over it. Then the doorknob rattled and Charlie came in, shaking rain from his collar. "Jake," was his simple greeting.

They had dinner together. Jacob ate two helpings of everything. Afterward, he and Bella washed up while Charlie opened the freezer and scooped three bowls of chocolate ice cream. They resumed their seats, and Charlie had the same question Bella had: "Alpha?"

"Not yet."

"Not sustainable," Charlie said. Bella sat back as the conversation became more business-like. "Riley Biers?"

"The same."

"Also not sustainable."

Jacob's eyes flashed. "We're doing the best we can."

Charlie set his mug aside. Gently, he said, "Tell me what you need from me."

Time, was all Jacob said. Charlie held his eyes for a long moment before putting a hand on his shoulder. "I can't give you that. His family has to be told something soon." Jacob lowered his eyes.

After dinner, sitting in Bella's bedroom, Jacob explained that Charlie was the Alpha of Forks.

"What?"

Yep. He was. The weight of leadership comes in many forms and is exerted in many ways, and last night's discussion had revealed many kinds of magic.

"My dad is not magic."

Well, no, said Jacob. But he could push, in his way, for change. Just the way he held Billy's stare, sitting at the other end of his table, had helped.

Jacob was on the floor, leaning against the side of her bed, with his knees bent and his forearms resting on top. Bella was thankful she'd made her bed that morning; her grandmother's pink, blue, and green quilts were tucked snugly in place. If Jacob had seen the sheets she slept in, she might have blushed at the intimacy. This was the first time she'd had him in her room since they'd kissed, and things felt different now. Was he self-conscious, too? He had his eyes closed, letting his head roll back to rest on the mattress. Bella perched in her desk chair. After a moment's silence, she nudged him with her toe.

He shook himself. Charlie was not magic, of course not, he continued. But though he was a quiet person—and he blushes like me, Bella interrupted, pointing this out in a whisper, in case he was listening. And he doesn't know a thing about cologne, she continued, and he could hardly look Joy in the eye when they'd first reunited—"Yeah, yeah," Jacob said, "Whatever"—he could still throw a little weight around, tipping the scales in last night's discussion. Like Bella, he was immune to Billy's whammy.

"The what?"

"The Order." Jacob tried to explain this. Part biology, part history, part heart, the Order of secrecy had spread like tainted water through La Push. Charlie and Bella were drinking out of different pipes, so to speak.

"What?" she said again.

"Never mind. It's very old." And it had laid its whammy on Billy, too. _He_ hadn't issued it. It came from far back, way, way back. Maybe from Taha Aki himself. Jacob promised he would tell her about him later. The point he was trying to make _now_ was that Charlie was the only person in that house who could tell Billy to shove it. That gave Jacob his chance to get a word in. All along, Sam had wanted to give Jacob the reins, but Billy didn't think he was ready. Billy wouldn't give up his own Alpha status. They hadn't understood this before. But there were several Alphas in that room, and it was hard to breathe in there. Sam was certain about stepping down, but not certain about the wisdom of telling the wolves' families. Billy used the weight of his uncertainty to pull him to his side of the scale. Jake tugged on Charlie, who pushed against Billy—there was a lot of arguing and surly looks at this point in the discussion—and the fifth Alpha, the one whose word toppled Billy, came from someone unexpected.

"Joy?" said Bella, flabbergasted. It almost made sense. Joy had a powerful personality and a strong desire to find Quil.

"Nope." Jacob yawned and stretched his arms. His eyes were sparkling.

"Emily?" She was not Quileute, but maybe like Charlie she had a forceful influence. And she had stood up to Billy and the council.

"Nope."

"Harry? Old Quil? Did they change their minds?"

"Split decision with those two. Cancelled each other out."

Then who could it be, she wondered.

Jacob looked immensely amused. "Sam's grandma. Or his great-grandma, that is. Ellen. That woman is a rattlesnake."

Yes, thought Bella. She could picture that now.

It turned out that Ellen Uley had become an Alpha by death and default. Her story was a woman's story, and she saw no reason last night to let "a bunch of pissy man-babies," as she put it, know her personal business. But she was mighty pleased to throw her influence into the ring like an Ace of Spades. Her husband had been part of the last pack. The 1930s pack.

"Oh!" said Bella. She was reminded of Vera's story and how the vice principal of Hoquiam High had been found in the woods, mauled to death, apparently by an animal. Jake's great-grandfather Ephraim Black had been there. His unusual behavior had attracted Mr. Horowitz's notice. "Something was different about him," Mr. Horowitz had said. Had Ephraim Black been a wolf? Did the vice principal die because of a vampire attack? The Cullens—or Culpeppers—had lived there, and she didn't want to think that they'd killed a person. But she didn't want to think that Jacob's great-grandfather had done that either.

Well, explained Jacob, all the members of the old pack were gone now, and Ellen Uley, wife of a wolf, was the last man standing. Last woman, that is. Bella found this fascinating.

"She could be an imprint."

 _Right,_ thought Bella. _The girlfriend thing._ _The thing where Emily feels sick without Sam._ She also thought, with a frown, _the co-dependent thing._ It reminded her of the way Renee felt without Bella before she'd married Phil. When Bella had been twelve, thirteen, or fourteen and had returned from a visit with Charlie, she'd find the house a mess, the cat suspiciously scrawny, and the lawn unmown. After a while, she'd begun to feel that she shouldn't go off and leave Renee alone.

Jacob yawned again, but he was still smiling. It had been, he said, "abso-fucking-lutely hilarious," to see Ellen depose the council. Checkmate. And during that chaos, with the men trying to pull rank while also trying to figure out what might Ellen's rank be, if any, and with Ellen firing back at them entirely in the old language, Embry had clarified the chanting they'd heard from the garage. Embry had sent Jacob the feeling of Bella's hand and her smile. Jake had exchanged an anxious glance with Sam and offered a deal: co-Alphas. They could be co-Alphas until he felt ready to take on the job alone.

No one had ever heard of co-Alphas before. More chaos. But Sam threw his Alpha weight in with Jacob's. It felt like they each had a little more than half the power they would have had alone. Sam took a deep breath. He looked like he wanted to laugh. He and Jacob hugged one another, which made Jacob laugh aloud because it was so uncharacteristic of Sam, while the council continued to argue. How will two slightly-more-than-halves make a whole, wondered the co-Alphas. _Maybe,_ said Embry from the garage, _the whole is greater than the sum of its parts._ Okay, said Jake. Maybe. So go ahead, he thought, and tell them!

That was where Bella came in, since the original Order persisted despite the change in leadership.

"You were wonderful," said Jacob. He scooted toward her desk chair on his knees and stretched his neck to kiss her as she leaned down. He tasted like chocolate ice cream. They were both smiling so much it was hard to kiss each other. "You blew everything open," he whispered, weaving his fingers through hers as she slid from her chair to kneel facing him. "You are my hand grenade."

She laughed and had to turn to the side to avoid snorting on him. "I thought I was your sweetheart or something like that. Something normal."

"You are not normal."

She leaned back, trying to frown at him, but he followed her till he found her lips again.

"You are my secret weapon. World's cutest bomb. My best friend." He kissed her again and whispered that she was the one he loved.

"Awful quiet up there!" hollered Charlie. "I'm going to come up and open that door in one minute because you cannot have a boy in your room with the door closed!"

Bella got up and opened the door. The phone rang—another interruption, she grumbled—and Charlie called her down to talk with Mrs. Newton about her work schedule. When she returned, Jacob was lying on his back on her bed with his mouth open and his eyes closed.

She hadn't the heart to wake him. She did her homework at her desk, and he was still sleeping, ninety minutes later. Charlie looked in on them. Darkness fell. The streetlights up and down her street flickered to life. She dimmed the light in her room and knelt beside her bed, wanting to stroker her finger over his bare forearm or his forehead, but she was afraid it would tickle and wake him. His heavy lashes made black crescents on his cheeks. Waking, his smile had distracted her from the dark circles beneath his eyes. Now she wanted to kiss them gently, but she figured that would wake him, too. Instead she lay her head on the quilt near his elbow and whispered, "I love you, too."

* * *

Jacob thought that Bella's room smelled nice. Girly deodorant and shampoo scents. Clean laundry. Green tea. Maybe, he thought, she drank tea sometimes while doing homework. He liked the smell of her skin and hair on her quilts. Her pillow smelled especially good. He fell backward into sleep quickly and deeply.

Shortly after midnight, he awoke in a panic, as if his mind had been suddenly yanked on a chain from the bottom of the sea.

 _Embry._

The grass in Bella's backyard was wet with dew. He was running on all fours before he could cognitively recognize how he'd gotten there. Swinging his legs over the side of the bed. The girl slipping to the floor. She must have been leaning against the bed, asleep. Then there was the window. Sliding the glass up. A question behind him, her voice. The cool air on his skin, his bare feet on the grass, then the smack of branches as he shot into the woods behind her house. He heard her voice at the window, but his clothes had already fluttered to the ground in shreds and he was running north, pulling the night air into his huge and powerful lungs.

It was a horse.

Emb, you scared me to death, thought Jacob. I thought something happened to you.

Dammit, Embry, are you crying? This was Sam's voice. The black wolf was running south from his nightly route near the Sol Duc. Are you crying over a horse?

Look at the horse! was Embry's reply. Oh, the horse!

Fuck the horse. This was from Paul. Hollering about this. Better it than you.

The horse. Jacob saw it now, a blurred image between Embry's eyes, Paul's eyes, and Sam's visual reaction to the images the others sent. It was a white mare. Ghastly in the starlight. Its screams hurt their sensitive ears. The horse was in someone's fenced paddock, part of a rural property about twenty miles north of Forks, beside highway 101 and bordering the national park. There was a small red barn, a white pickup and a blue Honda Accord in the driveway, and a two-story house whose lights were flicking on. Beside the screaming horse, a brown foal ran back and forth, snorting and stamping, its eyes wild, and circling the horse were two silvery gray wolves, one larger and one smaller and skinny. The black wolf burst out of the trees just north of the property on the other side of the highway. Mercifully there was no traffic. It raced over the asphalt and down the sloping gravel driveway while the red wolf shot out of the woods to the south and raced the last mile down the centerline of the highway.

What are you doing? cried Sam.

No traffic, panted Jacob. Faster this way. And no prints left behind.

Say the word, Sam. Paul bared his teeth, crouching before the horse. He roared at it. You say so, and I'll rip his head off.

I have to _think!_ said Sam.

Mud in the paddock squished beneath his paws. And Paul's. And Embry's. Prints everywhere. The horse bucked and reared, its forefeet coming down on Paul, and they all felt his rib crack. Paul grit his teeth, snarling, roaring louder. A blue haze spread through their minds, dulling the pain from Paul's body but also dulling their vision. Oxygen squeezed off.

Breathe, Embry, shouted Jacob, hurtling down the gravel driveway now. You're going to make us all faint!

Embry pulled in a gasping breath and sobbed. As a wolf, he made no sound, but his distress was obvious, heavy in their blood, pulling them down.

Get out, said Sam. Useless.

Phase back, said Jake. Talk to him.

By him, Jacob meant Riley.

Riley, or whatever Riley Biers had become, hung from the mare's neck, half-under its body and between its legs, clinging to its chest in a predator's instinct that kept him away from the wolves' claws. A strip of its skin hung from its neck like tattered wallpaper. Blood dripped over Riley's face, over his neck and shoulders, as Riley paused to return Paul's snarls. Then he fastened his mouth on the animal and pulled harder, his throat working.

Take him out, said Sam.

Paul lunged for Riley and yelped when his arm shot out and knocked him back.

Legs, said Sam. He leapt on the mare's back. Jacob could feel the animal's warm, coarse mane in Sam's mouth. Using his weight to roll the animal, Sam exposed the mare's legs for Paul to snap.

Oh, God, no! cried Embry. No, please!

Paul managed to break a foreleg as Embry's horror surged through their minds so forcefully that the red wolf, most tightly bound to him, staggered and fell.

Phase back, gasped Jacob, his muzzle in the mud.

Instead, Embry threw his mind wide into the night. It felt like a flash of light or a ripple from a little stone dropped into water, except that the force of it was nearly as devastating as his horror.

 _Quil,_ he called.

Jacob was aware of the brown wolf now, knocking over furniture in the Cullens' mansion and crashing through a glass door onto the deck. He struggled to find and follow Riley's trail, his legs slowed by a heavy emotion: guilt. Jacob knew at once that he'd been the one on Riley duty tonight. Quil had nodded off, just a moment's nap, and Riley had slipped out of the house. The red wolf tried to regain his feet but fell again in the mud, his vision blurred, as the small, silver one sent an arrow of _something_ lancing through the forest. Finding Quil. Terrifying him to greater speed.

Emb, stop! Jacob could barely breathe.

Embry only stopped when he saw the brown wolf hovering at the tree line, just past the barn. Quil, you phase back, Embry gasped. He knows you.

Only sort of! cried Quil, padding side to side, light on his toes.

People were shouting from the house now, a man's voice, a woman's voice, and three children. One was a teenage boy. Jacob could tell by the way his voice cracked. One of the younger children, a girl, began to scream and scream.

Phase back, Quil, ordered Sam, or help Paul.

Paul had taken another kick in the ribs, but he'd managed to break a hind leg. It was hard because the animal was struggling to get to its feet and coming down again when it tried to put weight on its broken foreleg. It was an open fracture; sharp white bone, slick with blood, gleamed at the break. Riley abandoned the whinnying, choking horse to take on Paul, and Sam, leaping over the horse, pulled Riley from Paul's back before he could get his arms around him and crush any more ribs.

What are you doing, Jake, screamed Sam. You're just standing there!

He was. Petrified.

The crack of a rifle sounded and a bullet embedded itself in the side of the barn. Riley struggled out of Sam and Paul's grip and turned toward the foal. Another flash from Embry's wounded, floundering mind hit them like a whip, and everything seemed to happen at once: Embry phased and rolled, gathering the foal in his arms and running for the barn. He barred the door with his body while the vampire pounded on it. Quil dropped out, too, and called, "Riley," softly. "Riley, it's me." Another rifle shot sounded. The man from the house was running across his field, maybe only two hundred yards from his pickup truck. It was clear that he'd try to use it as a shelter from which to fire at them again. Fortunately, the barn door faced away from the pickup. Quil held out a hand to Riley, who looked at the bleeding, broken horse, then at the naked, scared, brown-haired boy with whom he'd shared a milkshake and a walk in the rain one evening. There had been some other people there, too. A girl he had liked. The girl had long, dark hair. She was small and thin. Her name…. It started with a B. "Riley," Quil called. "Come with me."

Another shot hit the larger silver wolf in the shoulder; he yelped sharply and fell where the mare could kick him again. Jacob found the presence of mind to move, taking a blow for Paul and nudging him out of the way, and then the black wolf urged the wounded one toward the trees.

"Oh, my God," whispered Riley, looking at his blood-drenched clothes. "What have I done?"

"Come quick," urged Quil.

A window opened over their heads and Embry poured out as a cloud of smoke, gathering speed and solidity as he blew into the trees. Soon the small silver wolf was racing after the the other two. Riley wiped a hand across his face and the mare's blood got in his eyes. "Help me," he whispered, timid as a child. Quil took his hand and led him away as another shot rang out, echoing through the valley, and then the red wolf was left alone in the muddy paddock, the horse gasping and bleeding out at his feet.

Make it look real, came Sam's voice in his mind, and then a picture of what he had to do. He knew there was no other choice and no time left. The red wolf growled to frighten the man, hoping to delay another shot, and leaned over the mare. He looked at her rolling, wet black eyes and remembered the deer that had died beside the highway in Bella's arms. I'm sorry, he told the mare. Then swiftly, he slashed the bulging veins high on her neck, just under her jaw, so her blood poured out faster. It would be over in another minute or two, but he didn't have time to let her find peace. With his teeth and claws, he tore open her abdomen, hot yellow and pink entrails steaming in his face, and as she thrashed he pulled her intestines over the mud, past her broken legs, because that's what a pack of wolves would do. He spat hot blood. He drew his claws over her white flank one last time because Sam said so. Then he dodged another bullet and vanished into the forest as the man came shouting, crying out over the body of the horse, and a little girl, maybe seven or eight years old, threw off her mother's arm and went running over the field, tears in her voice, calling, "Daisy!"

On his way back to the Cullens', Jacob paused at the bank of the Sol Duc River. The others had come this way, too. He followed their tracks down the bank and into the cold, swift water. He let himself go, slipping beneath the surface. He welcomed the cold water on his skin beneath his warm fur, beneath his musk and sweat and disgust. When he climbed out on the other side, he didn't shake himself but walked on with the weight of the water on his body.

He wished he hadn't heard the mare's name.

* * *

The Alpha of Forks telephoned the Alpha of Old La Push shortly after midnight, after one of the new co-Alphas leapt from his daughter's second story bedroom window and raced into the trees. Old Alpha put the new co-Beta on the phone, informing her of her rank as she did so.

"Me?" said Emily sleepily. "I'm the what?"

Forks' Alpha learned that the boys were likely at the old Cullen place. Co-Beta didn't know what may have happened, but the pack's rotation that night had been Sam on four feet north of Forks, along the Sol Duc, Paul on patrol closer to the Cullen house, and Quil on the inside playing checkers with Riley.

"That's where they're keeping him?" said Charlie. "Will they kill him?"

"I don't know," said Emily. She offered Charlie advice for damage control after Jacob's phase and told him not to go to the Cullens' place because the boys weren't sure how long they could keep Riley satisfied with squirrels and deer.

The Alpha thanked her and said goodbye. Then he and his daughter went out back with a flashlight and a paper bag to find what was left of Jacob's clothes. His T-shirt was black, and its shreds were especially hard to find. Bella picked up the remnants of her birthday gift to him, the one that said, _Don't Make Me Kick Your Ass._

"Oh," she sniffed. "He really liked this shirt."

Charlie ran a hand through his short dark hair. "I guess we could get him a new one."

Back in the house, he asked his daughter for the Cullens' phone number. Of course she had it memorized. He dialed the number, and when he didn't hear a recorded message from Century-Link phone service of Washington saying that the number was no longer in service, he frowned hard. The phone rang and rang and rang. No one answered, but the line was still active.

* * *

They lay Paul on the deck on an oversized, fluffy, lavender bath towel that had probably belonged to the littlest Cullen. _This stupid towel is way nicer than the ones in my house,_ thought Jacob. _What the fuck is this made of?_ He looked at the tag: combed Egyptian cotton. And it hadn't even been used. There was a discreet, modest little tag that still said, $84.00. He stifled an urge to spit on the towel.

 _Go ahead,_ thought Embry. _I'll help you._

But Jacob wasn't talking to Embry. No one was. Embry folded his arms and sat back in a deck chair while Sam felt Paul's rib cage and gently wiped the blood from the wound in his shoulder with a wet cloth. Paul sucked in a breath through his teeth. The wound was deep, and the bullet had only wormed deeper into his flesh with the motion of his legs as he ran back here.

"I can't even see it," said Sam, kneeling over him.

"I saw this in a Clint Eastwood movie," said Quil. "Or maybe it was Chuck Norris." He had found an unopened bottle of brandy in the Cullens' liquor cabinet. Jacob frowned harder, wondering how many other things in that house were just wasted for show. Peeling the foil seal away, Quil unscrewed the cap and poured a generous amount into Paul's wound.

Paul made a choked sound and cursed at him.

"Are you crying?" Sam said teasingly, gently. "No crying."

An hour ago, those words had sounded very different when he'd directed them at Embry. Embry _was_ crying; he'd been crying since he'd gone out to relieve Paul from patrol and discovered Riley and the horse. Sometimes he wiped his hand over the back of his nose. Sometimes he walked to the edge of the deck and stared into the dark clearing. He wasn't wanted.

 _We want you,_ thought Jacob. _Of course we do. But we're freaked out. What are you doing to us? What happened back there?_

 _I don't know,_ thought Embry. _Maybe I'm not cut out for this. I could just stop phasing. I could try._

 _No. But you need to settle down._

 _And the wind should stop blowing. Right. I'm a mess, and_ _this is what I do._

 _No, it's not._ Jacob rubbed his temples, staring at the varnished planks of the deck between his feet. Were these boards redwood? Like, coastal California redwood? Where could you even get boards of this length and width these days? This must have cost—

 _It is. It's just that nobody knew it because once upon a time, my thoughts were my own._

"Could you just talk out loud?" snarled Sam.

Jacob realized that he'd been staring at the deck with his eyes unfocused and his mouth slightly open.

 _I'm useless. He said so._

 _He was upset,_ countered Jacob. _He didn't mean it._

 _I'm going for a walk._

Jacob suggested that he could help Jared with Riley, but Embry said he was probably the last person in the world who could cheer up someone else right now. He melted into water that dripped between the deck planking, came out from under it as a tiny hailstorm in the clearing, and ambled into the woods on small paws with his silvery shoulders hunched.

Jacob didn't know what to say to him. He had to drag his mind away, again and again, from the image of his claws on the mare's jugular veins. It seemed that he could still feel—that he might always feel—the heat of her entrails in his mouth. He'd torn the guts out of a living creature. Am I a monster now, he wondered. What would Bella think if she knew what I did?

"You want to hear a joke?" said Quil. He was kneeling over Paul. "One time a rattlesnake bit Chuck Norris. After three days of horrible agony, the snake died."

"That's funny," said Jared from the house.

Jared had phased into the pack half an hour ago to take over Sam's patrol, seen what had happened, and said, "Yeesh." He met them at the Cullens' house, where he was now in the bathroom, standing guard while Riley took a shower.

"No jokes," growled Sam.

"He's just trying to help," said Jacob.

"He got me _shot_ ," snarled Paul. He tried to sit up and fell back, gasping.

Quil hung his head. Sam had chewed him out twice already. He set the brandy bottle on the deck and went into his house to take a shower in one of the other bathrooms. There were four and a half in the house. Jake and Embry had already taken a turn to quickly rinse off. Some of the doctor's clothes fit Embry okay; he'd chosen a pair of white linen slacks that fluttered above his ankles, and which were now lying on the deck, getting all wrinkly, Jacob hoped.

It surprised him to realize how much he hated the Cullens' possessions. Was it because they were fancier than he could ever have for himself, or because they belonged to his mortal enemies, or because they belonged to the creatures who had broken Bella's heart? Probably all those things. Nevertheless, he chastised himself for being covetous. That wasn't how he was raised, and his mother wouldn't have wanted him to dwell on it. Just the same, Jacob couldn't find any clothes in the house that fit him right, which spared him the moral debate of whether or not to put them on. He just tucked a bath towel around his waist and sat on the porch with Sam and Paul.

"I wish I could stop bleeding," said Paul.

It was the least hateful thing he'd said all day, which worried them.

From an upstairs bathroom came the sounds of Quil turning off the water and drying himself. From the downstairs bathroom came the sound of Riley vomiting blood. "I think you've had a little too much to drink," they heard Jared joke, but Riley started to cry anyway, making strangled sounds, and Jacob and Sam looked at one another bleakly.

"Some co-Alphas we turned out to be," Jacob muttered.

"Don't you start crying, too," said Sam. "For fuck's sake."

"If I die," said Paul, "tell my dad I'll see him in hell. But only if he asks about me."

"You're not going to hell," said Sam.

"You're not going to _die,_ " amended Jacob.

Paul made a little sigh, a "hoooo," sound, and closed his eyes.

When the phone rang, they twitched, startled. Sam directed Quil to answer it, but to make no sound. Just listen. There was a pause, and then, "Oh, Charlie, it's you." Another pause. He called for Jake and Sam, set the phone on the counter, and came out to hold one of the Cullens' down-filled throw pillows to Paul's shoulder.

"How many of you are there?" said the Forks Alpha.

"Five," said a co-Alpha. "Maybe five and a half." They weren't sure where Embry was.

"Could you hold off the vampire if I come?"

"Maybe. Probably. He's not interested in Paul, and Paul's bleeding pretty bad." Very quietly, Sam added, "We're scared." Jake had never heard him say anything like that, to anyone.

"Could you hold him off if I bring Sue Clearwater?"

"Yes. She won't smell as delicious as you."

 _What?_ mouthed Jacob. Sam had information he didn't. _Later,_ Sam replied.

"Is there an exit wound?" said the older Alpha.

"No."

"Maintain pressure. Elevate the feet. Have you explained to Riley what he is?"

"No."

"Put him on the phone."

Charlie had some other orders for them: Regroup. Forgive. Try to understand each others' weaknesses and strengths. Learn to trust again. And pre-heat the oven to 425 because he was bringing a couple of frozen pizzas.

Okay, they said.

Jared brought Riley to the phone. He was shaking, wrapped in somebody's tasteful, gray, Turkish terrycloth bathrobe, his eyes wide and raw though unable to produce tears. His pupils had almost disappeared in his orange-red irises. He sat on the floor and clutched the phone with both hands, saying "Hello?" like a little child. "Mom?"

"No," came the soft voice over the phone. "This is a friend. Do you remember me?"

"A friend?"

"You helped me with my history homework. We had chocolate milkshakes."

"With Oreos?"

"Yes. Yes." Jacob could hear the tears in her voice. "I'm Bella. Do you remember?"

"Bella?" Riley's face crumpled, and he squirmed into a corner beneath the Cullen's kitchen table, drawing his knees up to his chest and wrapping an arm around them, still clutching the phone. "Bella, I'm scared."

Jacob left them to talk and cry together. If anyone could explain this gently, he knew Bella could. Did she love this guy? he wondered as he returned to the deck. The constellations he knew so well, the ones he'd waited years to share with Bella, had moved to unfamiliar places this deep into the night. Or this early in the morning. It must be three a.m. It would likely be another day of missed school. He certainly couldn't go and chance falling asleep in class; others could, but not he, the future chief. _Future Fucker-Upper,_ he thought. _Future Stand-There-Scared-While-My-Packmate-Gets-Shot. Future Killer-of-Beautiful-Things-I-Couldn't-Save._

He tried to forgive himself, like Charlie said.

Sam and Jared were kneeling beside Paul, lifting his legs onto a pile of pillows. "Hurts," said Paul.

Why wasn't he healing?

Jacob knew that if Paul didn't make it, Sam would order Riley killed. As co-Alpha, Jacob would not protest. Would that make him a murderer? Killing Laurent the vampire had been like killing a monster. Killing Riley the vampire would feel different. Wrong. But he was still a vampire, and therefore a danger to those around him. He was not a human being. The horse was more human than Riley, in a sense. _But maybe I'm not a human being either. Am I?_ Murdering someone, even a vampire, would make him feel less like a human being and more like a monster. Closer to whatever Laurent had been. _Please, God, let me stay a human being. Is it too late?_ His ears, which were perhaps no longer those of a human being, detected a faint burbling sound. He realized it was blood in one of Paul's lungs.

Jacob took a deep breath, holding the cold air in his lungs for a moment, letting it cool him. He let his mind sink into a quiet, dark place, a place where he might be able to reach his brother. _Emb, come back. You didn't do anything wrong._

Nothing.

Jacob's hip ached where the mare had kicked him. At least he'd done something for Paul back there. Now he set his forearms on the deck railing and clasped his hands. He let his mind fall farther, past memories of elementary school, past his mother's funeral, past Christmases with his twin sisters when they made twin snowflake ornaments in school and hung them side by side on the tree. He let it fall the way he imagined a scuba diver might purposely fall backward from the side of a boat, and he sank into cold, deep memories, finding the times when he and Embry had constructed miniature worlds when they were four and five years old. Embry had arranged sticks into forests, stones into mountains, and Jacob had peeled moss and lichens from trees in his backyard to blanket Embry's worlds in green velvet.

There he stayed, reaching for his brother without words, and the constellations wheeled slowly over the forest, over the boys on the deck, over the house where friends wept together, over the highway where a man drove north in his daughter's bald-tired truck so no tracks of a registered law enforcement vehicle might be found on the property if a boy died that night. The stars wheeled over the ocean, over the little seaside town where a husband woke his wife and tried to explain why she needed to get her medical kit and come out to their truck _right now._ And though only the stars knew it, their light fell, too, on a silver wolf who crept home under the branches of his mother's bottle tree, where wind blew over the little glass mouths, making the tree sing. The bottles, clear and green and amber, pale pink and deep cobalt blue, held wishes and nightmares. The wolf left his skin beneath the tree and slipped into the house, where he found some clothes and tiptoed into his mother's bedroom. He said, "Mama, wake up. Mama, it's Paul. He needs— I think he needs somebody to love him."

* * *

 _ **Thank you for reading.**  
_

 _I hope you enjoyed this chapter. I was able to get thank you notes with previews out to reviewers for the last chapter, so YAY, I can offer that again with more certitude this time. Do let me know what you think, and I'll send you a preview!_

 _Questions that can help me..._

 _1\. Should Riley be killed? Why or why not?_

 _2\. Should I let Paul die? Why or why not? Why isn't he healing faster?_

 _3\. In what ways did the pack work well together in this chapter? In what ways did they struggle? Who (if anyone) is at fault for what happened with Riley, Paul, and the horse?_

 _4\. What do you think about the concept of multiple Alphas? Charlie said that co-Alphas are not a sustainable way to lead the pack. Do you agree? What do you think about the roles the adult Alphas played here: Charlie, Billy, and Ellen?_

 _5\. Can love be found on a chart or diagram with minimal social group overlap? What do you think of Angela's choice?_

 _6\. Have you ever had to read steamy stories to old ladies? (AmandaForks was once in this position. Sooooo awkward.)_

 _7\. Is Embry causing problems for the pack? What should I do with him?_

 _8\. Favorite bits?_

 _That's a lot of questions. But if one or two (or more!) pique your interest, please let me known what you think. Thank you! I am eagerly hoping to hear from you!_

 _P.S. I'm posting this on a Monday. A friend told me that hardly anyone review things that are posted early in the week. What?! Noooooo! Prove my friend wrong!_


	13. Chapter 13 Under New Management

_Thank you to all who reviewed the last chapter, including amguevara88 and guest readers to whom I couldn't write to thank personally. I loved hearing from you. Thank you. Please enjoy this new chapter._

* * *

 **Chapter Thirteen**

 **"Under New Management"**

* * *

The wind sang in the bottle tree, and the strings of seashells and sea glass hanging from the eaves quietly tinkled and chimed. The house smelled like pie crust and corn flakes, frying bacon and windex, mildew and ivory soap. These were the scents and sounds that slowly brought the boy back to himself early Thursday morning. Waking further, he realized he was ravenously hungry and his head was reclined too far; he had slept on his back without a pillow on a brown sofa whose springs were mostly collapsed. Immediately his mind fired with the need for vigilance, and keeping his eyes shut, in case anyone was watching, he assessed his surroundings with every sense except sight: the singing wind and the chimes; the sensation of being horizontal, which made his pulse race because his belly and neck were exposed, and a deep, throbbing ache in his left shoulder. His left arm was bound tightly to his chest in a sling, and therefore his mobility was compromised. On his tongue, the taste of blood: his own. He caught the scent of his clammy, stale sweat, but also scents of cleanliness and nourishment.

Cleanliness and nourishment? Where the fuck was he?

Concentrating, he searched for the scent of another person. Yes, he was not alone. There was a woman. And there was a window open. He could smell the dewy grass and the salt wind. The air moved freely, no tiny whine of passing through a screen. Good. Was he wearing shoes? No, they had been taken. Was he clothed? Only jeans. No matter. He heard water running, the woman in another room, and he risked opening an eye. Embry's house. He should have known. The place smelled like him, too. Looking down, he saw that his arm was bound to his chest with what looked like the remains of someone's pale blue cashmere sweater.

Soft.

Adrenaline and dopamine surged through his blood and brain. When he heard the water stop running in what he figured was the kitchen sink, he moved fast. His right hand gripped the windowsill and he tucked his body tight as he vaulted through the opening. The grass was seven or eight feet down; without his left arm to balance as he landed, he stumbled and slid to a knee. Just as quickly he was up again and running. He avoided the gravel driveway and kept to the grass, his footfalls silent. In seconds, he'd reached the cover of the trees, taking a trail that led uphill through the property of one of Billy's sisters. His thighs ached. His chest ached, too, with sharp pains stabbing him each time he had to rotate his torso, and he remembered last night: the mare's hooves, his attempts to get his teeth into the vampire's neck, the crack of a rifle. Halfway up the hill, he dashed across a little-used gravel alleyway and into another patch of trees, struggling farther uphill without a trail. At the top, he paused just inside the tree line.

It was early morning. Still misty. He crept into Old Quil's garden, veiled in the gray damp air, and rooted up some of the old man's carrots.

* * *

Bella stayed home from school on Thursday morning, and Charlie, in a rare show of generosity and lax parenting, let Jacob stay with her. Really stay with her, in her bed. She could hardly believe it. She could hardly stay awake, and Jacob was even more exhausted. This was probably why Charlie only had a staring contest with her boyfriend before he went to work. Bella had watched them, yawning. Charlie stared, and Jacob stared back. Eyebrows were lifted. Eyebrows were lowered and brought together. After what seemed like several minutes, but which was probably only one or two, Jacob lowered his eyes. Then, still feeling Charlie's stare, he lowered his head and shuffled his feet. Charlie kept staring until Jacob hunched his shoulders and dropped his head even more, and Charlie held him in this humiliating position for another long, long minute.

"I'll be returning at frequent and unpredictable intervals," he said. Then he went to work.

Charlie's silent admonition had lasting effect. Jacob couldn't even raise his head as he climbed the stairs. Bella followed. In her bedroom, he shucked off his shoes and socks and flopped onto her bed, curling on his side.

"Kill the light," he groaned. "Don't you have any curtains?"

Yes, she did, but Sam had destroyed her curtain rod a couple weeks ago when he'd ripped it off the wall and stamped one end of it flat to probe for Edward's things beneath her floorboards. _Stupid Edward,_ she thought. _Your stupid stuff made me lose my stupid curtain rod, and now Jacob can't sleep well._ "Sorry, no," she said.

Jacob rolled into his other side, facing away from the window. Yawning again, Bella took off her shoes as well and sat on her bed between Jacob's knees and elbows, with her back to his stomach. When she scooched closer and lay down, pulling one of his arms around her, he groaned again. "You can spoon me," he said, "but I can't spoon you." He made another groan that sounded almost like laughing—or crying—and turned his face into her pillow, saying something else that she couldn't understand. From his tone, she gathered that he felt pretty sorry for himself.

Bella got up and walked around the foot of her bed so she could curl up behind him. It was hard to figure out what to do with her left arm, which was on the bottom. "Elbow," complained Jacob. "Geez, come on." She got her left elbow under her half of the pillow, wiggled closer, and put her right arm around him, under his own arm and on top of his rib cage. Jacob took her hand, which stretched her arm, and held it near his heart.

"It's hard to spoon you," she grumbled. Her twin bed was too narrow for two people (or, she amended, for Jacob and anyone else), and she felt like an afterthought on his body, a little slug clinging to a big apple. But she did her best to get her knees behind his, and she squeezed his hand and used his rib cage as something solid to pull against as she got her torso pressed firmly against his back. Jacob complained about that, too, saying, "No," in a voice that sounded close to tears. It took her a moment to realize why—which made delicious shivers run through her body—and she retreated a bit so her chest wasn't touching him so closely. He sighed. They lay still. But only for a moment.

"I love you," Bella said.

"I love you, too."

"I love you a lot."

"Me, too."

"This is so nice."

"Mm-hmm."

"Are you tired?"

"Yes, damn it."

He was so warm that she was content to sleep on top of her quilts instead of under them. Bella kissed his T-shirt between his shoulder blades and closed her eyes.

* * *

True to his word, Charlie returned at frequent and unpredictable intervals. Jacob slept through his checks, but Bella, who had been better rested for the past week, slept lightly enough to wake up each time her father looked in on them. "Go away," she moaned. Around three o'clock, he made her get up and come downstairs to do the homework Angela had dropped off for her. She had left a note, saying that she was going up to PA that afternoon for some shopping with her mom, so she couldn't stay to chat. Bella was glad. It meant she didn't have to lie to her friend about why she hadn't gone to school today. She made herself a peanut butter and jelly sandwich.

Charlie said he'd had to get back to the station, but first he wanted her to know that there was going to be a meeting tonight, a pack meeting, at seven o'clock at Sam's house. She was expected to show up. Jake, too, of course. Charlie left her in charge of waking him up on time to get there.

When he had gone, Bella looked over her homework. A lab report—impossible to fill out at home since she hadn't been to the lab—a set of Pre-Calculus problems, a set of short essays—one paragraph or so—for questions about themes in Frankenstein, which she was still reading for English class, and a heap of Spanish verbs to memorize. _Ay, crumbs. ¿Porque?_ Except for the lab report, she completed her homework and then checked to make sure Jacob was still asleep.

He was. That meant she could get to work on something she'd talked about with Riley on the phone. The pack members, Sue, and her father had been busy helping Paul, and she had devised a plan to help Riley. She'd need something sharp and a strong stomach. Perhaps her razor. If Jacob noticed anything, she could say she'd nicked herself while shaving.

Later she took a shower, washing herself extra well with apricot-scented exfoliating soap, thinking that she would make herself all sweet and pretty for Jacob. Then she thought, yuck, is that a fifties house-wifey thing to do? She wrinkled her nose. It made her remember that her pores could use a good scrubbing, so she exfoliated her face as well. It felt nice. Refreshing. But so confusing. She squeezed her eyes shut tight and stuck her face in the hot spray from the shower head. When she had rinsed the apricot scrub from her face, she sat on the floor of the tub and smeared raspberry-scented shaving cream on her legs, and as she shaved them smooth, smooth, smooth, she tried to decide why she was doing this.

 _Am I making myself extra pretty for someone else? Is that sad and weird somehow, like, shouldn't I first aim to please myself?_

 _Am I merely performing my ordinary ablutions? You know, basic hygiene? Nothing special._

 _Am I doing this because Edward didn't want me to be extra pretty? Like when I wore all those boxy flannel shirts? Or did I avoid sweet soaps because he said he liked my natural scent?_

 _What is my natural scent? Armpit? How is that romantic? I bet Jacob is not interested in my armpit._

 _I wish I wouldn't compare Edward and Jacob._

It was the most complicated shower she had ever taken.

Before she knew it, she had used up all the hot water and was still covered in foam and bits of leg hair. She quickly rinsed in water that was becoming increasingly cold, and when she got out and dried herself, she realized that she'd forgotten to bring clean clothes into the bathroom. Now she was naked, and across the hall there was a boy in her bed.

Wrapping her towel tightly around herself under her arms, and tucking in the extra fabric above her sternum, she combed her wet hair, tiptoed across the hall, and peeked into her room. Jacob was still asleep. She crept inside and slowly slid her top dresser drawer open. It made no sound thanks to the bar of soap she had rubbed on the bottom of the wooden runners, a tip she had once read about in _Good Housekeeping_. Glancing over her shoulder to make sure he was still asleep, she left that drawer open and eased open a bottom drawer to get a pair of jeans.

"Stop!" cried Jacob, and she spun around so fast that she knocked her elbow into the side of the top drawer. It slid farther out, teetered, and tipped over, spilling undergarments in a slow, filmy, fluffy white waterfall of cotton and nylon, mixed with splashes of pastels and prints.

 _Unmentionables!_ The word flashed in her mind. Bella clutched her towel to her chest and bent to cover them up.

"No!" cried Jacob, sitting bolt upright. "Do not bend over!"

"Don't look!"

"Don't bend!"

"Don't look at my underwear!"

"The towel is too short!"

Bella blushed beet red at the thought of what Jacob had almost seen. Then she went redder with indignation. "Don't look!"

"I can't not look!"

"Why are you awake?!"

"You smell like food!"

"What?"

"I'm hungry! I woke up, and you're all bending over—"

"I did _not_ bend over!"

Jacob sniffed discreetly, and mumbled, "Sorry. You actually smell like artificial food."

Bella started to bend to pick up her unmentionables, then thought better of it. "Go away," she sniffed.

"I'm sorry. I'll help you pick them up."

"No!" She pointed to the door and stood on her pile of underwear, still clutching her towel to her chest.

Jacob slunk out like a guilty dog.

Bella scurried to lock the door behind him and put her hands over her face. Thank goodness Charlie wasn't home. She got dressed standing in front of her closet in case there was a key hole in the door. She knew he wouldn't peek if there was one, but her blood was rushing too hot to be reasonable. When she was decent, she knelt to pick up her things.

Most of her underpants were plain, light colored cotton. A few had little holes near the waistband where the stitching had come loose. She had been the same size for three years, and these things were probably just as old. It embarrassed her to think that Jacob had seen her old crummy underpants. She was pretty sure he'd glanced at them as he left. Her bras, too, were kind of old and crummy, except for the pink satiny one she'd been wearing on Monday when they made out in the Rabbit. He'd asked to see it, and feeling terribly bold, she'd let him peek at one inch of one strap.

Well, now he'd seen everything. Every single stitch of every single garment.

There went her Smurf panties, she thought, refolding them, and there went her My Little Pony pair. They had been on sale, and she figured no one would ever see them. There went her white pair with a hole in the side seam, and there went her Wonder Woman pair and her Bat Girl pair. There went her white cotton bra, and her beige one, and her black one, and two more beige ones.

 _My underwear is boring,_ she thought. _Or weird._

 _No, my underwear is private._

Having a normal boyfriend was harder than she'd thought. She smudged away a tear as she ended up comparing Jacob and Edward again. There had been no chance of Edward's seeing these things. Now that she had a choice of whether or not to reveal them, she felt confused. She tried to tell herself that she didn't have to be ashamed of having boring underwear, and that Jacob did not like her for her underwear. She also thought that even if she had prettier underwear, she might still feel embarrassed and awkward. She'd never had a boyfriend before, not really. Was she supposed to feel more at ease?

 _I don't know if I can do this._

Of course, even if she could learn to feel at ease about having a normal boyfriend, and even if she had nicer underwear, there was still a huge reason to feel embarrassed and awkward: _Underwear avalanche = oh, my god, no. Why does stuff like this keep happening to me?_

She smacked her dresser drawer shut and clomped downstairs. Jacob was in the kitchen, having helped himself to a bowl of cereal. His cheeks flared pink when she sat down opposite him, and he dropped his eyes.

"Let's never mention this again," she said.

"Deal."

* * *

At the pack meeting, Quil sat on the floor at his mother's feet. Joy kept a hand on his shoulder or smoothed his curls as if she didn't want to let him away from her touch, and he leaned his head against her knee.

Sam's living room had been rearranged to accommodate every chair in the house, placed in a circle, and the adults occupied the furniture while the boys sat on the floor. Bella, Emily, and Kim shared one hunter green, plaid, upholstered armchair, the younger girls perching on the arms while Emily took the middle and held her elbows close to her sides. Kim had made some blueberry Jiffy muffins, the kind that come from a box of powder and rise to the size of golf balls in the oven on a good day. A plate of them was passed around. On the kitchen counter were pitchers of lemonade and iced tea. The council had shown up. Harry, Old Quil, and Billy sat on wooden kitchen chairs (Billy having left his wheelchair at the bottom of the porch steps and walked very slowly, with Harry and Sam's assistance, to the chair) and tried to make nice with the boys' parents. At least, Harry tried to make nice. Billy and Old Quil sat quietly, making neither nice nor trouble. Sue Clearwater was there, too, and Jacob, sitting at Bella's feet, whispered that she had come to the Cullens' place last night to help Paul.

Paul himself was sitting in a corner, wrapped in a blanket. He wore jeans but no shirt or shoes. His left arm was still bound to his chest in a blue cashmere sling—Bella recognized the torn sweater as Rosalie's—and a large white pad of gauze was taped to his shoulder. He leaned his head against the varnished, golden pine wall and closed his eyes.

Things had changed. The boys sat quietly while others took charge.

"I call this meeting to order," said Emily firmly. She had a yellow legal pad across her lap and a purple colored pencil in her hand. "Item One: Please talk quietly because Claire is upstairs asleep."

Okay, said everyone.

"Item Two: Rank, responsibilities, and reporting structure."

Things indeed had changed. Bella listened, impressed, as Emily announced the adjusted hierarchy of the pack.

Jake and Sam: Active Duty co-Alphas.

Charlie, Ellen, and Billy: Advisory Alphas.

Jared and Emily: co-Betas.

Paul, Embry, and Quil: Active Wolves.

Harry and Old Quil: Advisory co-Betas.

Allison: Accountant.

Sue: Medic.

Kim: Snack Maker, mostly of baked goods and high-protein quick foods. ("Just make some hard-boiled eggs," said Emily.)

Joy, Tiffany, Jennifer and Gary Cameron—Jared's parents, Bella learned—and Kathleen and Gordon Musselwhite—Kim's parents—and Clara Uley: Rotating Providers of Hearty Dinners, with financial assistance from whatever reason the Quileute Council could devise for drawing tribal funds in addition to pack families' contributions of whatever they could afford.

Further, Harry and Old Quil would supplement meals with fresh vegetables, fish, and game. Any wild turkey or deer they shot would have to be dressed in Sam's yard so Leah and Seth wouldn't notice.

A few of the adults had double duties, including Ellen Uley, Scaler and Filet-er of Fish; and Jennifer Cameron, Parent Coordinator. Joy Ateara was named Laundry Educator, and tomorrow after school all the boys were expected to show up at her house to learn how to wash and mend their own clothes. After successful completion of her course, each boy would receive a needle and a spool of thread. Quil's heavy, black brows sank as he glanced at the other boys. Was this some kind of trick? he seemed to be thinking.

Bella leaned over Emily's shoulder to read her list. It all looked so official, especially with their titles written in capital letters. She noticed her own name just as Emily read her title aloud.

Bella Swan: Advisor on All Things Vampiric.

"Me?" she said.

Of course, Emily said. Everyone needed her input.

She risked a glance at Sam, the Council, and Sam's great-grandmother, sitting by the cold fireplace and whittling fat wood chips into it with her bowie knife. They all looked grim and tired, but willing to work with her. "Okay," she agreed.

Ellen Uley lifted a large, white plastic jug from beside her rocking chair, unscrewed the lid, and glugged some clear liquid onto the wood chips. Paul, sitting nearest the fireplace, wrinkled his nose.

"Reporting structure," continued Emily, reading from her paper. "All wolves report to Jake and Sam, or, in their absence, Jared." The boys all nodded, except for Paul, who opened his eyes long enough to roll them. "Parents report to Jenny Cameron, who will organize meals and other support jobs, and Jenny reports to me." Here, the other adults thanked Jenny for stepping up, and Jenny said, "Permission to speak?"

"Granted."

"I want a different title." She wore her long brown hair in a ponytail. She looked about forty-five or fifty years old and fiercely fit in her yoga pants, strappy sports bra, and close-fitting tank top. Jake whispered to Bella that she taught yoga in Forks and in Port Angeles, at a fancy gym, but it didn't pay much. And on Tuesdays, she taught yoga for free in the Quileute Community Center. "How about Pack Mom?" said Jenny.

"All in favor?" said Emily.

All hands went up.

"All opposed?"

No hands.

"Approved," said Emily, "and noted. Jenny, Pack Mom."

This meeting was much more smoothly conducted than the previous one Bella had attended in the woods behind Sam's house. It was much nicer to sit on a chair, even if just the arm of it, in a house with lemonade and muffins. Much nicer to have no vulgar interruptions from Paul. Jacob had told her, as they were driving here, about what had happened with Riley, the horse, Paul, the rifle—all of it. Bella had to chastise herself thinking that if Paul's nearly fatal injury had subdued him, then wouldn't it be nice if every day, somebody could shoot Paul?

As evening fell, Allison switched on more lamps in the living room, and Ellen tossed a match into the stone fireplace, where her pile of wood chips burst suddenly and violently into tall flames.

"Grammy, come on," said Sam, flinching. "Quit soaking them things in kerosene."

"I like kerosene," she grumbled.

"You're just burning things to burn things. Gonna set this place on fire one day, damn it."

"You watch your mouth," said Ellen, Clara, and Allison at once.

"You try growing up with no kerosene," added Ellen. "Then you get some kerosene and you see how you like it. More magic than you."

"It is not."

"Good. Then you won't mind if I use it." She picked up her knife again and a small log to make more wood chips.

"Grammy—" began Sam, but Emily said, "Shh! Claire."

There was some more discussion of pack positions and responsibilities, after which Emily asked if anyone had a question. Kim's father Gordon raised his hand (it was cute, Bella thought, how the adults responded to Emily as if she were their teacher) and said that he'd missed the meeting in Jacob's garage the other night, and he wasn't so sure about all of this. It happened to be his birthday ("Aww! Happy birthday!" everyone said) and he wondered if they were all playing an elaborate prank on him.

"Wolves?" he said. "Really? Kathleen, is this a joke?"

Sam looked at Embry with one eyebrow raised, and Embry sighed. He stood up, moved the coffee table out of the center of the circle, and faded into a silver cloud, re-materializing as a silver wolf. A regular sized one, thought Bella, not a giant one like the others. Embry turned in a circle a few times, following his tail, stepping lightly on the clothes that had slipped from his human form, making them into a nice nest, and lay down, curled meekly with his nose tucked under his tail.

"Holy—" said Gordon, and Emily said again, "Shh!"

Gordon looked at his daughter very hard, and Kim gave her father a timid smile with her eyebrows lifted, as if to say, "Gee, Dad, isn't this cool?" Gordon did not look like he thought this was cool. He looked like Charlie had looked when he found out she had dated a vampire, and she got the feeling that Kim was in deep, deep shit. Bella cringed for her as Kim moved to snuggle under her mother's arm like a duckling under a wing. Unfortunately, Kim's mother didn't look like she thought this was cool either.

"Item Three," said Emily. "Damage Control."

Those who hadn't already heard about what happened last night gasped. It was horrifying, and Bella, teared up as she learned more about it: the horse's screams, Riley hanging from its neck and half under its body—hiding from the wolves' claws—, the blood everywhere, the brown foal he had almost eaten as well, the father of that family shooting at the wolves with a rifle, and the little girl crying, running through the grass.

Bella wasn't the only one with tears in her eyes. Harry seemed more tired and ill than ever. Even Paul looked affected, paler, sighing heavily as he leaned beside the fireplace, though Bella couldn't be sure if he felt sorry for the horse or for himself. Grimly, Sam described the way Riley had peeled the horse's skin away in strips to suck on its flesh.

"Don't those things go for a vein?" said Gary Cameron. He looked utterly repulsed.

"We assumed that. Bella?" Sam looked to her. "Is that normal?"

"I don't know," she managed. "The Cullens didn't talk about how they ate."

"Well, the horse was clawed to shreds." Sam looked sickened to talk about it. "We had to break its legs to get at the vampire. Jake had to finish off the horse. Paul, as you can see, was severely injured."

Paul gritted his teeth and opened his eyes long enough to glare at Quil, saying, "Fucker fell asleep. Got me shot."

"You watch your mouth," said Sam's family.

Bella put a hand on Jacob's shoulder, and he looked at her with tears in his eyes, too. "I had to," he whispered as Sam began to describe what they'd left in that paddock.

"Stop," said Bella. She didn't want to cry—or let Jake cry—in front of everyone. "Why do you have to tell us all this? Just say it died."

Emily put a soft hand on Bella's arm. "He has to say it," she whispered, "because it justifies Item Four, coming up."

The room buzzed with horror. Horror at what a vampire was capable of, horror that Paul might have died—Sue averred that it was pretty close, with his bleeding staunched only when she'd managed to dig out the bullet— and horror that there was an honest-to-god vampire near Forks right now, unharmed and staying—they hoped—at the Cullens' house. Horror that the Cullen family, for a few years, had lived as seven vampires in their midst.

"Why didn't you kill all of them?" demanded Kim's father.

"Because of the treaty." Harry tried to sum it up for everyone. It just led to more horror that Billy's, Sam's, and Big Quil's grandfathers had entered into a nonaggression pact with those creatures. "We were outnumbered," Sam said. "Then and now."

Bella was still thinking about Item Four. Dread lay heavy in her stomach. Jacob, sitting cross-legged, tugged on her hand until she slid from the air of the green chair and sat the same way on his lap. He wrapped his arms around her as the parents gripped their children, shaken by the life-and-death risks these boys faced every day. Some said the boys shouldn't go out there; it was too dangerous. Sam looked at Embry, who lifted a lip to bare his fangs, growling softly, and flexed his claws. See? Sam must have been thinking. We can beat those things. But Embry's growl reassured no one; it just amplified the fear and adrenaline coursing through the room. Bella turned her head to smudge her teary eyes against Jacob's shirt.

Kim's father also demanded why the boys hadn't killed Riley last night.

"Is that where Jared is?" said Jenny. "You left him alone with it?"

"Quiet, please," said Emily. "Please."

"I ordered him killed," said Sam. "Last night. I said to Paul, 'Take him out,' but we couldn't get a grip on him, and then Quil talked him down."

"We couldn't have killed him anyway," said Quil. He looked exhausted. Jacob whispered that he had gone to school today. "What would we have done with the pieces? Torched them next to the horse? Dragged them off and risked getting slowed down? Getting seen?"

"You don't have to drag them off," said Ellen. "Kerosene. They're full of it. I remember because I made a poem. Make a scratch, light a match. Good, eh?"

 _That's a horrible poem!_ thought Bella.

"They're not full of kerosene," said Sam.

"I always wanted to see one explode. You take me to him. When you do it. Let me throw the match."

"Jesus, Grammy—"

"Shh!" said Emily. "Please. Item Three is Damage Control. Charlie?"

The owner of the horse had called the station around two o'clock in the morning. Matt Hathaway, on night duty, had gone north to the site, and in the morning he'd photographed the remains. Wolves, said the man. A pack of wolves. Huge ones. They could strike again. But the evidence didn't support his claim of giant wolves. Only small prints could be found. A pack of wolves, yes, but not a pack of giants. The man must have imagined they were larger in his fright. Charlie said that the man agreed that might be so. Charlie also said that the wolves had had a close call and needed to calculate better strategies for maintaining secrecy, starting with covering tracks. Literally. Riley's footprints would also have been a huge problem, especially if he was still wearing the hiking boots he'd disappeared with. Those treads were sought by cops in two counties. But Hathaway had found no human prints in the paddock, except for those of the man and his family.

"How'd you manage that?" he asked.

The silver wolf looked at Jacob, who said, "Emb went back. He re-printed all the mud with his normal-sized paws."

"Don't go out on your own," Sam said. "You gotta tell us where you are."

"Reporting structure," emphasized Emily.

The silver wolf looked deflated, but Charlie said, "Hey, now. He's the only one of you who thought to cover your tracks. I'd say that was pretty damn smart."

"Sorry," said Sam. "Of course, we're glad you did that. Thank you."

Well, said Charlie, Embry had gone a long way toward resolving Item Three. Jacob looked at the wolf and saw his chest swell as he lifted his head again. Nevertheless, said Charlie, some Forksians were forming a hunting party to eradicate what they figured was a wolf pack that had travelled west from the Cascades, or even farther, from Canada. In the past ten years, Washington had seen wolves return to some of the territory they'd lost in the early twentieth century, renewing debate between ranchers and conservationists.

"Debate?" said Sam wearily.

"Debate," said Charlie dryly. His tone told Bella this was the mildest of euphemisms.

The wolf attack, Charlie said, was going to be on the front page of the Forks Forum tomorrow with two color photos of the white horse: one alive, with a little girl holding her lead, standing in a field of tall grass, and one dead, eviscerated in the mud. A reporter had contacted him and Deputy Hathaway for their reaction.

"I said, of course, that anyone who sees a wolf should call the police."

Someone gave the tiniest snort of laughter.

"Not funny," said Sam.

"This is your third sighting," continued Charlie, "and there could be more that I don't know about. What are you going to do to prevent another? Sooner or later, you'll get shot at again."

From his corner, still with his eyes closed, Paul said, "Item Four."

Bella knew what Emily was going to say before she said it. She looked at the older girl with tears in her eyes, but Emily looked away as she said, "Item Four: Killing Riley Biers."

* * *

The sun was going down over the forest behind the Cullens' home. Jared said, "Take a walk with me."

The creature that had been Riley Biers, or Riley who had become a creature, remained still. He—or it—sat on the Cullens' redwood deck and leaned against the house with his knees drawn up to his chest and his arms wrapped loosely around them. His eyes were open.  
What did he see? Every needle on the hemlocks? Could he count them all in an instant? If so, would he want to? He had remained in this position all day, the sun warming him like a stone as the hours passed and it swung in its wide arc over the home and the clearing. His pale body glittered like quartz or white marble with flecks of mica.

Jared had been awake with him all day, reading books he'd found in a bedroom that he guessed belonged to Bella's ex-boyfriend. Books with titles like, _Chopin, Pianist and Teacher: As Seen By His Pupils_ and _Camille Saint-Saens and the French Solo Concerto: 1850-1920._ At least, he had tried to read them. They were, to Jared, abysmally dull. By four o'clock he was carefully tearing the pages out and folding origami swans. Around five o'clock, bored and ravenously hungry, he'd asked Riley if he felt like a squirrel. No response. So Jared left him on the deck for a few minutes while he stalked and snagged a rodent. Skinning and gutting it helped pass the time. He filleted it as best he could and braised its tiny pieces in the Cullens' kitchen in a brand new frying pan with some dried spices that were displayed alphabetically in a cabinet and a bit of the brandy Quil had found. He carried it out to the deck on a plate.

"Want some?"

The creature had looked at the plate and offered fork as if it had never seen such things before.

So Jared ate alone—the squirrel didn't taste very good, but it also wasn't very bad—and made paper airplanes out of sheet music he'd found on the piano. The pages were far bigger than the books' pages. The grand staves and black runs of sixteenth notes made nice stripes. In the golden, late afternoon light, he sent them sailing over the clearing. When they landed, they disappeared into the tall grass as if nothing had happened. Gently, Jared tossed one into the side of the vampire's head. Still no response.

The phone rang. Jared lifted the receiver but made no sound until the caller identified himself. Sam.

"Bring him to the beach north of La Push. Five miles or so north. We'll meet you there."

"He won't move."

"Tell him Bella will be there."

"I don't know. I think he might be dead."

"He what?"

"Dead. If vampires could die twice, this one's dead."

"Then drag his carcass to the beach." Sam hung up.

Jared returned to the deck. The vampire had moved. There was a fingerprint in the squirrel grease left in the pan. There was a corresponding mark on the vampire's lips, and the vampire was now keeled over on its side, its red-orange eyes still open, staring bleakly at the forest.

"Good?" said Jared.

No response.

"Yeah. Me neither." He nudged the vampire's back with his foot. "We gotta go for a walk."

Ten minutes later, Jared was dragging his carcass to the beach. In the linen closet, he'd found a merino wool and silk blend blanket in a pale shade of lavender. He'd also found a well-used length of silk rope. Whatever floats your boat, he thought. On the deck, he spread the blanket, rolled the curled up vampire onto it, and tied the corners together with the rope. It was surprisingly strong. And the vampire was surprisingly heavy. He put the rope over his shoulder and pulled his burden through the woods, feeling a bit like Santa Claus.

The thought of Santa Claus bringing a vampire to someone for Christmas made him laugh to himself. Would that be worse than getting a lump of coal in your a stocking? Much worse. Ha ha ha. For one thing, the vampire wouldn't fit in a stocking, and for another, your whole family would be dead in an instant. A very un-merry Christmas. Ha.

These were Jared's thoughts as he slogged toward the beach. He also thought that the blanket and its boulder-like load were making a wide, muddy trail, exactly the kind of thing the Alphas would not want to see in the woods. He had to stop every hundred yards or so to brush leaves over it, replace stones, and even replant a few saplings. He hoped the blanket would hold up until he reached the beach. There were a lot of thorny holly bushes along the way.

Twilight came to the forest. As Jared walked on, his thoughts sank from a darkly funny Christmas disaster to an awareness of light and dark, pine and shadow, and the sounds of water moving over rocks half a mile to the south. The Sol Duc. He smelled the bruised leaves and the wet, black scent of overturned soil. Slowly, as his mind sank deeper, he ceased to be aware of the words for those things. He merely saw and heard and smelled them. Then his awareness of the sensations faded, too, because the sensations became the material and identity of his being. He moved through the woods as part of the woods.

* * *

Getting to the beach was complicated. Emily wasn't going. She hadn't known Riley, Sam didn't want her to go anyway (the thought drove him half-mad), and she needed to stay with Claire, Quil, and Joy. Shortly after the meeting broke up and most people went home, Claire had toddled down the hall to use the bathroom and Quil had looked at her. It resulted in a lot of shouting that Bella didn't understand, tears from Emily, a lot of names thrown at Quil, including pedophile, which he had to have defined, and commands from Sam and Jacob to stay the fuck across the room from that little girl. Confused and frightened, Quil had huddled in a corner by the fireplace next to Paul, who opened his eyes and said, "You are so fucked." Claire peed on the floor.

"What was that all about?" demanded Bella as she, Jacob, and Charlie rowed across the cold Quillayute River in the dark in Sam's crummy little aluminum boat.

"Later," grimaced Jacob.

"No, you tell me now!" said Bella.

"Please. Later."

 _You should have told her about this already,_ came Embry's voice in his mind. The silver wolf was already on the sand, running north.

"Shut up," said Jacob. Bella glared at him, and he added, "Not you."

"Look," said Charlie, "I got a lot to do tomorrow, so you better not let us die tonight."

 _Sure thing, Chief_ , thought Jacob. The underside of the bow bumped against the north bank, and Jacob helped the Swans climb out. They clambered over a bunch of slippery rocks at the foot of the jetty and met Sam on the beach. Then they stared at one another.

"I'm not a pony," said Sam.

So they clambered back over the rocks to the rowboat.

Bella stared at the heavily clouded, starless sky and the black ocean as Jacob rowed them up the coast and the boat bobbed in the waves. She was thankful that it was a windless night. Jacob was strong, but still only as fast as the black wolf could trot. It took an hour to reach their meeting point. Embry was there first, sitting tall on the sand, tail moving back and forth, making a soft swishing sound. _They're still about half an hour away,_ he told Jake. _Vampire bundled in a blanket, not moving. Jared has to drag him._

 _Why won't he move?_ thought Jacob, pulling the bow high onto the beach so Charlie and Bella could step out onto dry sand.

 _Jared says he's dead._

Jacob tried reaching with his mind farther into the forest, but in his human form, he couldn't find Jared. He couldn't find anyone but Embry that way. So he relayed Embry's information to Sam, who said that was good because it gave them time to make a pyre.

"To what?" cried Bella. "You said—"

"We voted, Bella. I'm sorry."

"Jacob?"

"It wasn't unanimous, Sam," said Jacob. "That's why she's here."

"I let her come to say goodbye," growled Sam.

Jacob pressed his lips together and dragged a long driftwood pine trunk to the pile Sam had started. Charlie gathered some smaller branches under his arms. Building the pile gave Jacob something to concentrate on besides second guessing his decision to bring Bella. Bella didn't want to say goodbye; she wanted to test Riley. Too late, he understood this. She had whispered her crazy idea to him in the boat while Sam ran ahead. She was, she explained, maddeningly delicious. Jacob was horrified to hear this, and if it weren't for Charlie in the boat, he might have lost his composure. What the fuck, he demanded, was she doing dating a thing that was tempted at every moment to eat her? Charlie did not reprimand him for cursing, which made him think that Charlie had already been over this with her. Bella started to tear up, and Jacob had yelled, "No! No, you do not get to cry over this right now! Why were you doing that? Acting like some kind of jelly doughnut sitting in a cop car!"

Charlie interrupted to mildly state that he didn't care for that stereotype.

I'm sorry, Bella had said.

Jacob dragged another bleached, stripped driftwood tree trunk to the pyre, frowning hard. He should have been firmer. He'd been planning to leave her in the boat. Now he realized that she had been planning to get on the beach, all delicious-smelling, and talk Riley down based on two weeks of a friendship he barely remembered. Jacob had been planning to leave Charlie in the boat, too, maybe a dozen yards off shore with an anchor, but now he saw that he had been planning to try to block the vampire from Bella. Jacob supposed if he were her dad, he wouldn't have been able to live with himself if Bella got killed and he hadn't tried to stop it. _But Charlie, you couldn't stop it. Maybe_ I _can't stop it._ Charlie seemed okay about dying like this. That's what dads did. Jacob wondered why tying up his daughter's willful ass wasn't something dads did.

Or maybe Charlie figured that since all those Cullens hadn't eaten anyone (that they knew of), and since Riley hadn't attacked him or Sue at the Cullens' house last night, then maybe Riley wouldn't attack him now. But Bella's deliciousness was a factor he hadn't counted on. His hands were trembling, almost blurred, and he tried to take deep breaths and concentrate on remaining in his human body, tried to concentrate on the feeling of the smooth, cold wood on his palms and the sensation of grainy black sand under his toes.

 _I wish she had told me about the deliciousness problem,_ he thought.

 _Probably she wishes you had told her more about imprinting,_ thought his brother. _Makes you wonder what else you two ought to talk about._

Jacob directed a wordless emotion at Embry, but it was hard to communicate like this when only one was phased. In the pack's visual metaphor, Paul had pinned him with the color pink. A pink ribbon. But it was hard to make a pink ribbon look pissed off. What entered Embry's mind was an image of a sour-pink snake uncoiling from behind a toilet in an abandoned park service restroom.

 _That's great, Jake,_ thought Embry. _Lovely. Shouldn't we do something about her tastiness?_

 _Smell,_ Jacob reminded him. The sour pink snake wrinkled its lips ( _Snakes don't have lips,_ thought Embry) and glared disdainfully at a light blue bird perched on a dumpster as it slithered out of the restroom and into a parking lot where the asphalt was cracked from the sand heaving under it during years of storms. _Shut up,_ thought Jacob. _Shut up because she's not going to taste like anything; she's just going to smell good._

The small wolf sent a fuzzy blue blankie into his brother's mind. _Hugs?_  
 _Hisss!_ went the snake, and Jacob rolled his head, stretching the tendons of his neck. Maybe he should have turned the boat were they thinking, Charlie and Bella? Maybe he needed to revise his estimation of Charlie's intelligence. Or his estimation of Bella's.

 _Shut up, Jake. She is perfect. Nearly perfect. Pretty close to nearly perfect. Sort of pretty close to being decent at decisions about trusting vampires not to eat her._ He looked over his shoulder at her perched on a log, sitting straight and tense, her face pale in the dark. Pale as a moon. Pale as a pearl. She had opened her eyes very wide, struggling, he figured to see in the dark. _Okay, she is smart about school and bad at decisions about trusting vampires. Very bad. But I love her and she loves me, and that's the main thing._ He felt his heart tightening.

 _It'll be okay,_ Embry told him.

Charlie looked at the silver wolf and his friend's slack-jawed son. "What are they doing?" he said.

"Talking to each other," grumbled Sam.

Charlie muttered something that Jacob pretended not to hear, but the wolf snickered. A little blue bird snickered in Jacob's head, twittering, a tiny gem of color swooping around the gray, dingy parking lot.

 _Hisss!_

 _Work on your alter-ego, Jake. Pink ribbon to pink snake? Where's your imagination?_

With an audible grunt, Jacob became a squat, pink toad in his brother's mind.

 _That's adorable. Now watch me go._ The blue bird became a blue eagle, then a blue dragonfly, then a squeaking blue bat.

 _Show off. Turn yourself into a jellyfish._

The blue bat became a blue jellyfish that immediately flopped out of the sky and onto the oily, cracked pavement, where it lay twitching. _Why did you have to imagine this argument in a shitty parking lot, Jake?_

Jacob heaved another length of driftwood onto the pyre. It wasn't a proper pyre. It was just a big pile. The only proper pyre he'd seen had been in a movie, Return of the Jedi, with Darth Vader's melting helmet backlit by flames. It occurred to him that through his son's love, Darth Vader had been redeemed. But he'd died anyway and needed to be burned. Perhaps, he thought, through Bella's friendship, Riley could be redeemed, but it would be safest to burn him anyway.

He hated the idea. Who would have to claw him, rip his limbs off? Would it be murder? It felt like it would be murder. Which of his friends would blacken his soul this night? _Or,_ he wondered, _would it have to be me?_

Ellen Uley's words came to him: "Make a scratch, light a match." She made it sound so easy. FOOMPH! Vampire gone. As if he were thinking the same thing, Sam struck a match and tossed it onto the pile of wood. It ignited instantly, so big and bright that they all shrank back involuntarily.

"Geez, Sam, what the fuck?" said Jacob.

"Kerosene." Sam shrugged. "I brought some of Grammy's stuff."

 _Nice,_ thought Embry. He added that he'd connected with Jared again, and Jared said they'd be arriving in ten minutes or so.

Jacob joined Bella on her log. She was quiet, watching the fire. A tear rolled down her cheek, and he didn't blame her a bit. As Charlie, Sam, and Embry took a seat on the other side of the blaze, Jacob put his arm around Bella and pulled her against his side. The firelight made the stray wisps of her hair glow golden brown. He gently closed his hand around her small fingers when she lay them in his palm, and he closed his eyes and put his nose in her hair, breathing deeply. There was nothing so peaceful to him as this. He smelled her scalp, her hair, her skin, her tears, and her perspiration, which to him was startlingly delightful. _This is love? When somebody's sweat smells good to you?_ No, he corrected himself, it was lust. He realized that this moment was the kind he'd dreamed about for so long: getting Bella to come to the beach with him at night, feeling the warmth of a fire, hearing the sound of the ocean, smelling the salt on the wind. He wanted to lay her down on a blanket in the sand and look into her eyes. He wanted to know what her hair looked like when it was spread out beneath her like a mermaid's hair in the waves. _Your girlfriend is not a mermaid,_ he thought. Then he thought, _Your girlfriend is Bella!_ and a warm feeling spread through his chest. He could almost forget that her father was sitting twenty feet away and there was a vampire approaching.

"Tell me what happened," she whispered.

He knew she meant with Quil. "It's when you find your match." His good feeling evaporated. "The one you're meant to be with. It's powerful. Impossible to ignore."

"Like you would get married?" she said bleakly.

"Probably. Like Sam and Emily. Or Jared and Kim someday."

"Claire is three. Quil wants to marry her?"

"God, no. I hope not. Or maybe when she grows up. Jared just rolls with it, and Sam can't think of anyone else like that. Makes him physically sick to stay away from Em. We saw it. He tried for Leah, you know."

Bella closed her eyes and lay her head on his shoulder.

"It was so bad. In his memories, he can't walk right. He threw up a few times."

It was as if she already knew, thought Jacob, as he felt her spirit deflate. She already knew it hadn't happened for him with her, and she was smart enough to figure out that it could happen at any time with someone else. Not caring if the others saw or heard him, he faced her directly and gripped both her hands hard. "I would fight it." Her eyes glistened in the firelight. "Look at me. I would fight for you." Hoping that she could read lips, so that Sam wouldn't hear and be hurt, he added, _I'm stronger than him._ He didn't know if she understood. Her body seems to shrink, and he wanted to put his hands on either side of her face and kiss her mouth hard, but he scented vampire and shot to his feet, stepping in front of Bella, and locked eyes with the silver wolf.

 _If the vampire tries anything, save Charlie._

The wolf stepped in front of the man as Jared emerged from the trees above the beach with a casual, "Hi, guys." He waved and smiled and wiped the sweat from his forehead, standing atop a small ledge created by the high tide. Then he slid down the bank, his tennis shoes dislodging sand and little rocks from between tree roots. His burden bumped along after him like a tennis shoe in a dryer. Jared dropped the corners of the blanket to turn around and try to repair the bank, wedging some of the rocks back into place. Then he gathered the corners again and hauled the load to the circle of firelight.

"Hey, man," he said, nudging the blanket. "We're here."

Sam frowned, looking sideways at Jacob, who crouched a little lower, a growl rumbling in his throat. With a flick of his finger, Sam indicated that Jared should remove the blanket. But Jared only lifted a corner and leaned over to peek at the form within. "Dude," he said. "You should probably pay attention here."

The boys had a quick conversation in whispers too low for the Swans to hear. Jacob could sense Bella's apprehension even without looking at her. The vote, Sam told Jared, had condemned Riley. It was best, after what had happened to the horse. Sooner or later, he would kill a person. Indirectly, he'd nearly killed Paul.

"Don't I get a vote?" said Jared.

Sam blinked. "Uh, sure. Sorry."

"I abstain," said Jared with a shrug.

"Just get rid of the blanket," Sam growled.

"Wake up!" said Jared, in a normal tone so the Swans could hear, and he whipped away the blanket.

"Ohhhhhh…" said Bella behind Jacob, and he had to tell himself not to reach back there and swat her leg. The vampire lay on its side, curled like a fetus. Jacob cursed himself for thinking that this thing was at all similar to a human baby, but that was his first reaction. Unlike a baby, however, the vampire was a clothed adult male, wearing untied hiking boots, tan canvas pants, and a soft green T-shirt whose close-fitting sleeves hinted at powerful deltoids. There was a cartoon frog on the shirt smiling at a bowlful of breakfast cereal. Can You Dig It? asked the frog. It was an advertisement Jake recognized from when he was very young, and somehow it made him angrier. Baby, child, adult, human, vampire, animal, unnatural creature, immortal predator. What was he supposed to think? The vampire's orange-red eyes were open, directed toward the fire, but Jacob wasn't sure if he were seeing it or not.

 _Am I an immortal predator? An unnatural creature?_

Suddenly, he had to blink back a tear, which made him more angry.

"Riley Biers," said Sam. It was not said to get his attention. More like a formality. "You have killed a horse and nearly killed a pack member. You will one day kill a human." Sam glanced sideways at Jacob, who raised his eyebrows as if to say, get on with it. "You are a vampire," continued Sam, as if that weren't obvious, "and therefore this pack's members, council, and auxiliaries have resolved through majority vote that you must be put to death."

Embry thought that Sam had watched too many courtroom dramas on TV, and Jacob thought back at him to pay attention to Charlie.

The vampire made no move.

"Dude," said Jared. "You gotta die now, okay? For good this time."

The fire crackled, its light flickering over the white, immobile face of the vampire lying on the sand. Its hands were held between its knees, palms together as if in prayer. Jacob and Sam exchanged another glance. This was not going they way they'd thought.

"Riley?" said Bella.

"This is a trick," said Sam. "We'll get close, then he'll snap at us."

"Maybe he should get a vote," said Bella. Jake could tell by her voice that she was struggling not to cry. "It's his life, right?"

"Vampires don't vote," said Sam. He indicated that Jared, the only one on the other side of the fire near the vampire, should kick it. Nothing happened. Sam rubbed his hand over the back of his neck and looked at Charlie, who took a photograph out of his pocket. Sam passed it cautiously to Jared, who held it out for the vampire. When it made no move, Jared squatted beside it and held the photo near its eyes.

"Your family is afraid you're dead, Riley," said Charlie. "If you want, you can tell me what to say to them. Make your lie as nice as you like."

"Mom?" croaked Riley.

Bella choked back a sob. "This is wrong."

"She's right," said Sam. "Quicker is better." Grimly, he nodded at the silver wolf. "Make a scratch."

"No!" cried Bella.

"Get her out of here," ordered Sam, and Jacob did not protest. Charlie grabbed her arm. It was hard for Bella to keep her footing on the sand as he father dragged her backward, and harder for Jacob to look away from her and concentrate on the threat in front of them: an inert, white figure, curled tight, its eyes closed now.

"Breathe, Riley!" called Bella. "Breathe!"

Why? thought Jacob. Pointless. The vampire did move, however, its chest expanding as it pulled a deep, unnecessary breath into its stony, deathless body. What was it doing? Its red-orange eyes snapped open again, and Jacob realized it was assessing its surroundings. Scenting, he suddenly understood. It was pulling into its supernatural receptors the scents of the ocean and the fire, the salt and dried kelp on the beach, the body signature of each boy, the skin of the wolf, and—he was horrified to realize this—the scent of two humans, one of whom had blood richer than wine, more potent than TNT. For all he knew, Bella smelled like a seven-layer chocolate mousse cake. He had once seen a cake in a grocery store labeled "Death by Chocolate," and the cake flashed before his eyes for a second, jarring him with a new awareness: his inability to focus one hundred percent on his environment and the threat it bore to his loved ones.

As if the silver wolf could sense this, it sent a silver ring into Jacob's mind. It was a circle that filled his field of vision. The vampire was in the middle of it.

Embry made a tentative scratch on the vampire's arm, making a fluorescent purple liquid ooze out, as Jared patted its shoulder, saying, "Sorry, man. You want it to be quick?" Charlie Swan kept walking backward, towing Bella, whose sobs hurt Jacob's heart. He wanted to yell at her to be quiet; it was hurting him so bad and he had to concentrate to protect her.

 _She is your weakness,_ said his brother. The ring in his mind narrowed.

"Riley, breathe!" Bella sobbed, and Jacob caught the scent of blood. It was coming from behind him. The vampire's glowing eyes snapped open and it twitched, just once, before it clenched its eyes shut again. It clenched its whole body. "Breathe," said Bella, calmer now. Charlie let go of her, and she walked closer. She had poked her finger with a safety pin. Later, Jacob would learn that she'd had it in her pocket this whole time. "Breathe," she said. Sam phased, another set of clothes ruined, and stood over the vampire's body, growling. Slowly, Bella came closer and closer, Jacob hovering at her elbow, clenching his own muscles in an effort not to phase. Riley snorted once, an animal-like sound, and went still again.

"You can do it," whispered Bella. She squeezed a drop of blood from her fingertip and let it fall on a white seashell she'd picked up. She passed it to Jared, the only one of them who had remained remotely calm, and gestured for him to hold it to Riley's lips. Then she actually encouraged him to lick it. Horrified, Jacob shoved her back again so he could phase safely, but there was no need. Riley put out the tip of his tongue and absorbed the blood on the shell. He shuddered. "Ashley," Bella said. And nothing happened.

* * *

Billy and Jake did not have cable. When they wanted to watch TV, they had three choices. They could watch a video on their creaky VCR, or they could watch news, sports, and cooking shows on the one major network that could send a signal out to the boxy television set that had been his grandfather's. Billy said it was plenty good enough for his father, so it ought to be plenty good enough for them. On top were two antennae wrapped in aluminum foil. When the reception was shitty, Jacob would squeeze and readjust the foil. "Builds character," Billy would say. Every time Jacob had to pinch, crumple, or eventually replace the foil, he thought this was like living in a time warp. Their third choice was the public television station, which mainly broadcast nature documentaries and shows about Washington arts events. Once a month, however, the screen would turn bright blue and a scratchy, crackling sound would be heard, punctuated by a series of long, rattling beeps.

 _Beeeeeep. Beeeeeep. Beeeeeeeeep. This is a test of the Emergency Broadcast System. This is only a test. Had this been an actual emergency, this signal would be followed by information about public safety._

Jacob had to excuse himself from the others at the fire and pace down the beach—with Bella trotting beside him—to cool off. The rhythm of the waves helped.

 _Beeeeeep. Beeeeeep. Beeeeeeeeep. This concludes this test of the Emergency Broadcast System._  
 _Now back to your regularly scheduled programming._

Yeah, right, thought Jacob. He didn't know whether to be furious with Bella or commend her. "You're not mad, are you?" Bella said, to which he replied, "No, of course not. Not at all." Then he picked up a stone, flung it far over the water, and growled, "Yes. Yes, I am so, so pissed at you."

"Well, I—"

"I can't talk right now," he growled. They must have walked a mile, her jogging with his long strides until she began to pant. She might have a stitch in her side, he thought, but he couldn't make himself care about that right now.

"Then you can listen?" Bella said.

He didn't even grunt in reply, but Bella talked anyway.

It turned out that this Ashley person was a student at the University of Oregon. She was a history major, like Riley, and last winter she had broken his heart by starting another relationship with one of their mutual friends, a student Riley knew from film club and Ashley knew from a coffee shop where they worked. When Riley found out about it, she'd said that she hadn't wanted to tell him because she didn't want to hurt him. And the other guy, a person he'd thought was his friend, just never spoke to him again. Riley had dropped out of film club and spent the last year looking in the mirror, looking at his clothes, looking at his GPA. What about him wasn't good enough for her? And why hadn't he realized she wasn't that into him? Was he just stupid about reading people? He must be, since he'd also thought Ashley's new boyfriend had been his friend.

Riley's mother and father had split when he was in junior high. His mother fell in love with another man, a guy who managed the Forks Thriftway, so although his family split up, he could still see both parents easily. His father could also see his ex-wife easily, along with the guy who had taken his place, whenever he went grocery shopping. There was no other grocery store in Forks. Sometimes, Riley suspected, his dad invented errands to Port Angeles so he could drive an hour to another store. And if his dad shopped in Forks, he usually did it on Tuesday or Thursday nights, when the manager wasn't there. Riley realized, a couple years ago, that his father had memorized this other man's schedule.

What about his father wasn't good enough for his mother? They had never argued. Just fizzled out. What about himself wasn't good enough for Ashley? He memorized her class schedule for two semesters in a row, even memorized the paths she tended to take across campus and to the coffee shop. Was this stalking? he wondered. It seemed like the opposite of stalking. It was memorizing details of another person's life not to harass that person, but to protect oneself from pain.

Last night, talking on the phone with Bella, he had been very scared. He had become a vampire? That's what had happened to him? And now he had an innate and unshakeable desire to drink the blood of human beings? No, he had wept. No, that's awful.

Bella spent a lot of time convincing him that he was not imagining things. Vampires were real. Victoria was a vampire. She had turned him. The boys on the deck were wolves. Riley had seen the boys transform, so he believed her, and from that acceptance she had led him down the path of understanding and believing the rest of it.

"At least Victoria loves me," he'd sniffed. "So we can be together forever."

No, Bella explained, Victoria probably didn't love him. He didn't want to believe her, but Bella said that Victoria's tale about the murdered brother was actually a tale about her murdered lover. Bella's ex had killed James, so now Victoria wanted to kill Edward's ex.

There was a long pause. Then Riley said slowly, "But that's you."

"Yes…." Bella said. "Please don't kill me."

"God, no."

"But I'm super delicious. Like, really special. Like, Koolaid and crack."

"What's Koolaid?"

"Human sugary drink. Remember?"

"No?"

"Well, kids like it. It makes them hyperactive."

As Jacob stalked down the beach, the waves rolled smoothly over the sand and receded, making a hushing sound. He took deep, calming breaths as he realized that while he, Charlie, Sue, and the rest of the pack had been on the deck, concentrating on digging a bullet out of Paul or holding him down, Bella had been giving Riley a crash course in vampire morality. She'd coaxed important memories from what was left of his identity, memories of love for his family and friends, and a few memories, which she apologized for asking about, of "the worst time you've ever been tempted to do something you didn't want to."

Well, Riley had said through more of his choking, tearless crying, the worst temptation was his desire, for a year, to call Ashley and beg her to take him back. The stalking-not-stalking efforts didn't help like he'd hoped. In his trying not to encounter her, she was constantly on his mind. And it didn't help that she worked at Starbucks; there was a Starbucks every seventy feet in Eugene, Oregon, and the company's color was green. Just like the University of Oregon. And trees. And grass.

Associations multiplied in his head until triggers were everywhere. That streetlight near where they'd first kissed…. Ashley. All streetlights…. Ashley. Starbucks…. Ashley. Coffee from anywhere…..Ashley. Pretty soon life in Oregon = green = Starbucks = Ashley = streetlights = lightbulbs = light of any kind or green things of any kind = crying in front of a well-lit salad bar in his dorm = weekly trips to the university health center to see a counselor. He was embarrassed about it and went in the back door of the building.

"You didn't have to be embarrassed," Bella told him. "If I had a counselor, I'd go right in the front door." _Maybe. I'd probably go OUT the backdoor after Charlie dropped me off at the front,_ she thought, _because I kind of suck like that._

"Ashley," wept Riley. She was so sweet and smart and beautiful. She made him laugh. She liked soccer and mountain biking. He'd imagined the kids they could have. A little boy and girl with light brown curly hair, like him, and blue eyes, like her. But he didn't call. He walked to class saying, that green tree is just a tree. That grass is just grass. And he did _not_ call her.

Bella said if he could resist that, then he should call upon that feeling to resist eating her.

"I wouldn't eat you. I wouldn't eat anybody."

"Did you decide not to eat the horse?"

"No….. It just kind of happened."

"You need to cultivate your awareness and will power or they're going to kill you. They can rip your body apart and put you in a fire."

"What?!" he choked out.

"If you want to live, you have to think of Ashley."

"Maybe I don't want to."

As the waves whispered over the sand and Jacob led her farther and farther from the others, Bella told him she didn't know if Riley meant that he didn't want to think of Ashley, or he didn't want to live.

"Well, he's still alive," Jacob snapped. Now that the danger was over, the adrenaline he'd put into protecting her fueled his anger that she hadn't let him in on her plan.

 _This is a test of the Emergency Bella-blood System. Had this been an actual emergency, your girlfriend would be dead._

"So he's okay, right?" she said eagerly. "Jacob?"

He closed his eyes and counted to ten. Then he sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose. It was a gesture that had rubbed off on him from the Swans, and it was utterly useless. The beach above the tideline was dry. He sat down there and patted the sand beside him. Wrapping his arms around his knees, he leaned back on his sitz bones and looked at the dark ocean.

Nobody had wanted to kill Riley. Not even Sam. Sam was just trying to do the right thing. Now what? Had they done the wrong thing?

 _You got an order for us, Alpha man?_ came his brother's voice. _The other Alphas here say to put him back at the Cullens' place and downgrade his security detail to one wolf._

Charlie's words echoed in his mind: _Not sustainable._ But he told Embry it was okay with him, though they should first lead Riley through the woods and show him where two resident herds of Roosevelt elk usually grazed. Also, they should teach him how to bury a kill.

 _Like teaching a birdie to fly,_ thought Embry.

 _Fucking pterodactyl,_ responded Jacob.

There was a pause while Embry phased to his human form to convey Jake's idea. Then he was back with, _Charlie says the park service surveys the elk population. He recommends telling Riley to stick to deer because nobody counts them. Or he could try seals. Nobody counts them either._

 _Whatever._

 _Ahem,_ returned Embry.

 _I mean, say, Thanks, Charlie. That's good thinking._

 _Will do._

"Why didn't you tell me?" he said to Bella.

"You would have stopped me."

"Because I don't want to lose you."

"Well, I don't want to lose you either," said Bella, scooting closer on the cold sand. She lay her hand on his left elbow, and he placed his right hand over hers. "Why didn't you tell me?"

He knew she meant imprinting. It was the same reason, he realized.

"I would fight it," he promised again. "In fact, I'll refuse to do it." He shouted to the ocean. "So fuck you! I'm not doing it!"

"But Jake," she said softly. "You can't even not think about sex with those guys." Her voice was bleak, as if she'd given up on him already. It made a hollow feeling spread through him. "I'm so cold and tired," sighed Bella, and he shifted to cradle her on his lap while she lay her head on his shoulder and wrapped her arms around his middle.

As she slowed her breathing and fell asleep, Jacob looked at the dark curve of her eyelashes on her pale cheeks, slightly pink from the night air. He wanted to erase her doubt, but an image of her underwear spilling from her drawer in a white waterfall came to him, a reminder of exactly what she didn't want him to think about. That was nothing, however, compared to his desire to avoid imprinting. The clouds cleared enough for Jacob to see a single star shining over the water. _Mom?_ he thought. _Mom, look who I got here with me. I love her so much. Please help me to be strong._

In the forest behind him, night animals, a mouse, a weasel, burrowed through the leaves, and the trees gave off a green, heavy energy. It was the first time he'd sensed it, and he wondered if Jared felt this all the time. He listened to the waves on the beach and the white caps breaking just off shore. In the distance, he could hear the creak of the oars in Sam's boat, and he figured Jared, who had kept his cool (and therefore his clothes) must be rowing with Charlie and coming to find him.

Who had made the decision about Riley tonight? Certainly not him. Was it Sam? Charlie? At the meeting, Billy and Ellen had argued most fiercely for killing him. A majority of the others agreed. Now he would have to report that their directive had not been carried out. How would they react? And did an Alpha have to answer to them anyway? In the house, three of the five Alphas pushed for death. Jake and Charlie were indecisive, but it didn't matter because they were in the minority. On the beach, though, their indecisiveness became a majority, and it was as if he were standing in the horse paddock again, except instead of being immobilized by fear, he was immobilized by uncertainty. A stronger Alpha would have decided something, he thought. A stronger Alpha would have thrown that thing into the fire, and he wouldn't have needed to take a vote. One Alpha, one plan, immediate action. Wasn't that the way it was supposed to be?

Not sustainable.

 _Sam doesn't want to lead this pack,_ he thought, and _I don't know if I can do it._ The chanting of his friends and their parents in the garage the other night came back to him: You can do it! That was funny, he thought. This whole Alpha thing was turning into another aspect of his life that was shaped by others' expectations. It seemed like Fate had handed him two persons' loads. Be the chief one day. Sure. And be the Alpha right now. Right now!

 _Billy could do both,_ he thought. _But I'm not…. forceful like him. An Alpha should be forceful. Like Sam tries to be. Or like Ellen. God, I'm glad she's ninety-eight and moves slowly._

He bent to kiss Bella's hair.

 _You want an update?_ came Embry's voice.

 _I'm trying to have a moment with Bella._

 _And your pissy self. Update?_

 _Fine._

 _Charlie made us hug it out. Awkward cuz Sam and I were sort of naked. Charlie just flapped his hand at us and looked away, though._

 _And?_

 _Sam needs a lot more hugs than he lets on. I say we hug everything out from now on._

 _I'm not hugging Paul._

 _That's what keeps us divided._

 _No, PAUL is what keeps us divided. Paul is Paul._

 _Have you noticed he doesn't want anybody to touch him?_

No, actually, Jacob hadn't noticed that. _We could sneak up on him,_ he supposed. _Grab him._

 _I like my teeth,_ returned Embry. _And that would make us bullies. Hug bullies. Hug assailants. Oh, no, do you think that would be a violation of bodily integrity?  
_

 _You better give me that psychology book before you hurt yourself. Or just stop looking at it._

 _Watch out for the hug thugs!_ Embry thought, sounding like an advertisement for a horror movie. _They could leap at you from behind any tree!_

 _What makes you so peppy tonight anyway?_

 _I did the right thing, didn't I? To reprint the mud around the horse?_

 _Yes. Yes, you did._

As exhausted as he was, Jacob sent an image of a pink heart to his brother. Embry returned an image of a blue jellyfish, a half-desiccated lump on oily asphalt, raising one tentacle as if looking for a high five. It made Jacob laugh, and Bella stirred on his lap and sighed back into her dream.

 _I'm spending the night with Riley here. Tell my mom. We're going to sit on the sand—_

 _On opposite sides of the fire, I hope._

 _—yes—and stare at the ocean talking about depressing stuff._

 _Well, good. I'm glad you'll have some company._

 _I feel better already to see someone sadder than me. Oh, and guess what Bella had in her coat pocket sealed in, like, twenty ziploc baggies and a screw top thermos, surrounded by cotton balls soaked in vanilla extract?_

 _Aw, Jesus, no._

 _A bunch of paper towels soaked in her blood. She wants me to talk about Ashley and let him sniff it._

Jacob looked down at the girl on his lap with a mixture of horror and respect.

* * *

On Friday, Bella dragged herself to school. Paying attention was impossible; she just hoped to avoid her teachers' notice and not fall asleep at her desk. After school, she dragged herself to Newton's, where she had to spend twice as much time as usual putting sweatshirts on a shelf because she couldn't focus on the size tags and put them in the right places. Did the boys feel like this all the time, she wondered? At least they'd get a little more sleep since only one wolf was needed to look after Riley now.

Last night, Jacob was still somewhat angry when they'd returned to La Push, but Charlie made them hug it out, too. It was after midnight. They stood in Sam's driveway with their arms around each other, stiffly, while they talked about how new vampires have about ten times the strength of old ones. You might have told us that, said Jacob. I might have told Riley that, too, she replied, but I didn't. Charlie walked away to talk with Sam, and she and Jacob hugged more information out of each other, mainly about imprinting and vampires with special abilities. At last they felt like they'd told each other everything, and they breathed in the warm bodily scents of one another and sighed and murmured words of apology and forgiveness—even for Bella's comment about thoughts of sex and the pack mind, which he confessed had hurt him—and felt so, so much better. Then Charlie came back saying, "All right, all right, that's plenty of hugging," and he drove them home.

Also last night, though Bella didn't know it, other pack members contended with their own crises. One of them went home with his mother, wishing he could stay near a confused little girl, yet hating himself for wishing that. What kind of person was he turning into? Some kind of pervert? What was wrong with him? He couldn't figure out how he felt, truly, because everyone was yelling at him.

A second pack member fainted when he stood up to leave. The pack's medic said it was to be expected after so much blood loss. The boys were gone, so it had taken three parents to carry his sweaty, ungrateful, unconscious ass to Sam's truck, drive him to Tiffany's house, and lay him on her couch again. Tiffany considered tying a rope around his waist to fasten him to the cushions, but she knew what it was like to feel trapped, so she just cracked open a window and went to bed.

One of the co-Alphas crawled into bed and fell asleep almost immediately, only to wake, moments later, from a dream of the humming forest and the realization that his brother and Jared had talked to each other while Jared was human.

And a co-Beta received a phone call from her sister during the darkest hour. Had Bella been there, she would have heard an echo of her own advice.

"Are you walking around?" said Emily. "Are you walking around and around?"

...

"This is called a panic attack."

...

"You need more help. Is Mom there?"

...

"Okay, you put him down. Put him in his crib and go out on the porch. I'm calling Mom's house."

 _There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy._

On Saturday morning, Bella would stand in the lobby of the Port Angeles Humane Society while Claire picked out a kitten and Emily waited in the parking lot for her sister, mother, and nephew to arrive. More than one person's heaven and earth would expand this day. But on Friday evening, Bella couldn't know that. She only knew that she felt god-awful tired and grateful to see that Charlie had fixed dinner when she got home after her shift at Newton's.

A large white envelope lay on the kitchen table.

"Open it," said Charlie, his eyes was an evergreen tree symbol in the upper left corner, and it was postmarked "Olympia." The letter inside began, "Dear Isabella, we are delighted to inform you that you have been accepted to The Evergreen State College."

Bella stared at the paper. She'd almost forgotten about her application. She'd certainly forgotten to hope. Now she put her hand over her mouth to cover the bright, barking laughter of her surprise and joy.

* * *

 **Thank you for reading.**

 _I hope you enjoyed the chapter. Questions? Your thoughts on any or all of these questions would help me plan Chapter 14. Your thoughts would be like Koolaid and crack to me._

 _1\. Is it a good idea to let Riley live? Is he prepared to resist eating people?_

 _2\. Should Bella have told Jacob about her plan to save Riley? Was her plan even a good idea (safe? feasible?) in the first place?_

 _3\. What do you think of the way Emily has expanded and reorganized the pack?_

 _4\. How can Jacob become a better Alpha? Is he as flawed as he thinks he is? What could I write to help him develop himself?_

 _5\. What did you think of Embry's role in this chapter?_

 _6\. Why does it seem that Paul runs out of Tiffany's house in the beginning of the chapter? Should I have him do that again when he wakes?_

 _7\. Favorite parts?_

 _Thank you again! I LOVED reading your notes last time. They were very helpful. Previews to reviewers here! Please let me know what you think! [Sound of crickets chirping. Cricket. Cricket.] Are you there, readers?_

 _P.S. I have been to Forks three times now. The third time was just cuz my visiting relatives wanted to see the ONP. It's funny, though, I haven't met or heard from a single other person who's been there. Anyone? The crazy days are over for that town, but Pacific Pizza retains its Twilight-themed menu. Mushroom raviolis and Coke._


	14. Claire's Kitten & more

_Author's Note: Thank you to all who reviewed the last chapter, especially PastOneonta, Ariel-Scarlett, Kendall, fawnnwaf, MelkiSihou, PoisonIvy533, and ezinmaful... You gave me such thoughtful comments and great ideas, especially regarding Claire. You may see that your ideas have inspired me in this chapter. I'm sorry I didn't get to email all of you with individual thank you notes. Trying my best, though. And for every reviewer, I hope you know that I appreciate all of you, and all of your words! Please enjoy this new chapter. -AmandaForks_

 **Chapter Fourteen**

 **"Claire's Kitten, Angela's Sweetheart, Riley's Demise, and the Laundry Room of Desire"**

On Saturday morning, Bella sat at the kitchen table with Charlie, staring at the latest issue of the _Forks Forum_. There they were, as Charlie had predicted: photos of the white horse Riley and the pack had killed, one photo of it alive and lovely with its little girl owner, and one photo of it eviscerated in the mud. Bella had never seen the guts of an animal before outside of a science classroom on dissecting day, and even then she'd not seen them up close. Usually she was feeling faint in the school nurse's office on those days. But here was a full color photo of pink and yellow entrails, long loops of intestines, the white arcs of ribs exposed beneath torn flesh, and the pale, pinkish mass of a lung. The horse's mouth was open, tongue exposed, and her black eye, the one that wasn't in the mud, had turned dull and opaque.

She shoved the paper away and put her head on the table on her folded arms.

"Eat something, Bells," said Charlie. "Harry called. Emily and Leah are on their way."

But she couldn't choke down even the smallest piece of toast. As much as she'd like to believe that Riley had done that to the horse all by himself, in a state of excusable vampiric hunger and confusion, she knew that Jacob had done half of it in a state of stone-cold purposefulness because Sam had commanded him to do it. And Jacob had obeyed.

Wasn't he a co-Alpha? Couldn't he have said something like, "Wait a minute. Maybe we can help the horse." She tried to remind herself that the horse had been beyond saving and there was a man firing at them with a rifle.

Poor horse. Poor Jake.

Charlie said the _Peninsula Daily News_ would pick up this story and run it tomorrow in the Sunday edition. That meant people from Hoquiam to the Hood Canal, from Quilcene to Neah Bay, would be on the look out for a pack of wolves. And there were plenty of outdoorsmen-types around here, people who enjoyed hiking and hunting, people who owned guns. Even now, said Charlie, there was a group of men and women assembling at the Elks Lodge downtown, ready to drive up to the horse owner's farm and fan out into the woods, looking for animal prints—or the animals themselves.

"But there's a vampire out there," said Bella dully.

"Sam, Jake, and Jared'll flank and follow. And I have to put in an appearance."

"Blehhhhh….." said Bella, her head still on her arms on the table. "Sam, Jake, and Jared should be catching up on sleep."

"Well, they can't," said Charlie. "I'm meeting with a naturalist at the park service this afternoon. There have been real sightings, of real wolves, off and on around here for the past ten years. Unconfirmed, of course. I'm hoping to spin this into speculation that lone wolves, usually young males, have been exploring this area for a long time, in a perfectly normal way, then heading back east where there are others—girl wolves, basically—to induce them back to familiar territory."

"Girl wolves?"

"You know. Females."

"Is that true?"

"Pretty much. There are a few packs east of the Cascades."

"Really?"

"Yes," he snapped. "I've become a bit of an expert on Washington wildlife."

The doorbell rang. Today was the day on which Ellen Uley had promised Claire that Bella would get her a real kitten. Though sorry she had accidentally killed Claire's baby skunk, Bella hoped to avoid driving all the way to the Humane Society in Port Angeles. She had looked up animal shelters on the internet, and conveniently enough, there was a pole barn on the south end of town acting as a mini-shelter. With luck, there would be kittens. Bella opened the door and was surprised to see not Leah or Emily or even little Claire, but Angela. Her eyes were red.

"Can I come in?"

"Of course."

Angela was dressed in one of her usual leggings and long sweater outfits, this time a pair of navy blue polka dot denim leggings and a pink tunic sweater. Her hair was nicely styled in a smooth, high ponytail. Bella gestured for her to sit on the couch.

"I'm going downtown," said Charlie, "so you can talk about boys."

"Geez, Dad, you always think girls are talking about boys!"

Charlie smirked at them as he put on his coat, but as he turned to the front door, Bella saw his smile fade.

As soon as he was gone, Angela teared up. "My mom found out about Cody and Quil."

"How did she find out?"

"I told her."

Bella did not think she would ever understand the kind of relationship where a girl could talk to her mother about her problems. Angela's mom had asked why she was moping around, and Angela had confessed all: her hurt over what Ben had said about her awkwardness, her determination to get a new boyfriend, Quil's apparent disinterest, her inability to think of something to start a conversation with Cody about, and his apparent obliviousness that she had targeted him. Targeted him, but couldn't talk to him.

"My mom said, 'You want someone to love you,' and I was like, 'Yes,' and then she told me to go adopt a stray cat."

"She what?"

"She said a stray cat would love me forever." Angela tucked her fingers inside the cuffs of her sweater sleeves and dabbed at her eyes. "She said it would think I was the coolest person in the world."

"Well, it probably would."

"So I was wondering—"

The doorbell rang again. This time, it _was_ the guests Bella was expecting. Leah stood on the porch, wearing her blue anorak and jeans. She had her long, black hair in two gleaming braids over her shoulders. At the curb, Sam's big black truck idled beside Angela's little Corolla, with Emily at the wheel and Claire in the backseat of the quad-cab, pressing her hands against the glass and peering out at Bella with big, dark eyes.

"I told her it was Adopt-a-Skunk Day at the shelter," said Leah.

Claire took one hand off the window to wave at Bella, a quick, fluttery motion, before she teetered and pressed her hand on the glass again to steady herself.

"You're horrible," said Bella.

Angela came to the door, too, and Leah said bluntly, "What's wrong?"

"Boys," sighed Angela.

"Her mom said she should get a cat instead of a boyfriend," supplied Bella.

"Too bad we're only going looking for skunks," said Leah.

It made Angela smile a little. "I already dated a skunk."

Though chilly, it was a clear, sunny spring day. Charlie's rhododendrons were loaded with buds. Blue hyacinths bloomed beside the porch steps, sweet enough to smell just standing near them. The crocuses and daffodils near the mailbox were nearly spent, and tulip leaves were beginning to poke through the mulch beside the hyacinths. Suddenly, Bella recognized these as the same flowers bloomed in Jacob's yard. Could his mother have planted them here as well, taking care of Charlie? Giving him a little brightness in his life after Renee left?

Leah invited Angela to join them.

"Are you sure?"

"Sure. We'll just move Claire's carseat."

Emily killed the engine and slid down from the driver's seat. She kept her head lowered, letting her heavy, dark hair fall over her face, and the tips of her ears turned pink. Angela sank to a knee to greet Claire at eye-level as she introduced herself, holding out a hand, but the little girl scuttled behind Emily's knees. "She's shy," said her aunt.

Angela looked up into Emily's face before Emily could turn away, and what happened next was one of those moments that made Bella feel lucky—so, so lucky—to have Angela for a friend.

"I'm Angela," she said, simply extending her hand upward instead.

"Emily."

"I got burned by boiling water when I was ten. I lifted a teapot off the stove and it spilled. I had to go to the hospital and everything." She hiked up her sweater, pulled her leggings down a bit, and revealed a large patch of smooth yet gnarled-looking skin on her lower abdomen. The burn scar had hardened and thickened, and the red color in her skin appeared slightly marbled and shiny.

"Oh, my God, Ange!" said Bella. "I never knew that!"

"That's because I never showed you what's in my undies."

"It looks so weird!" blurted Bella.

" _You_ look weird," said Leah, poking her in the arm. "And rude. Geez."

"It's okay," said Angela. "It does look weird."

"Is this why you wear all those high-waisted grannie panties?" blurted Bella again, thinking of all the times they'd changed clothes side by side for gym class.

"So you _have_ been looking at my underwear," teased Angela. "Yeah. Sometimes I wish I could go to the beach in a bikini."

"Maybe you could," said Emily quietly. She put her hair behind her ears. "I got clawed by a bear."

Angela grinned at her. "If this is what the bear did you you, I'd be afraid to see what you did to the bear."

Silence. Emily frowned, her eyebrows pinched together, then slowly her face relaxed and the left side of her mouth, the still-flexible side, curled into a smile.

"Get it?" said Angela.

"Yes."

"You should say it was a bar fight. The bear was making trouble."

Rolling her eyes, Emily said, "Okay, okay. The bear had it coming to him." Still smiling tentatively with one half of her beautiful, brutalized face, she crawled into the backseat to move Claire's carseat to the center.

Behind her back, Leah offered Angela the world's most discreet high five. "I wish I'd thought to say something like that," she whispered.

* * *

It was hard for Bella to figure out if Claire was dim-witted or just a normal three-year-old. She had almost zero experience with little kids. They drove through town with Emily and Leah in the front seats and Bella, Angela, and Claire in the back. Claire stared at Bella long enough that Bella felt she ought to start a conversation.

"So you like cats? We're going to the cat shelter."

"Skunks?"

"No, those things you had before… under the porch? _Those_ are skunks. Cats are different."

"I like skunks."

Bella sighed. "I'm going to get you a kitten." She had her checkbook in her back pocket and hoped this errand would be quick and cheap. "They don't have any skunks at the animal shelter anyway."

Emily drove south past the Chinook Pharmacy, the diner, the Umpqua Bank, the high school, Pacific Pizza, and the shopping plaza that contained Newton's Outfitters, the Thriftway, and ACE Hardware.

Seeing the hardware store made her think of Riley. Angela must have had the same thought. "Do you think they'll ever find him?" she said sadly. "I don't know," said Bella. She hated lying, partly because it felt wrong, but mostly because she was so bad at it that she worried about getting caught. But she really could tell the truth here. The official story was that Riley was still missing, along with the unidentified woman—Victoria—he'd gone hiking with. Bella didn't know what Riley and Charlie would decide about whether or how to end the investigation.

Which was the greater mercy, to let Riley's parents keep hoping indefinitely, or to give them the peace of knowing for sure that he was dead? Charlie and the pack were strongly opposed to telling his family the truth, and Riley was so ashamed and horrified at what he'd become that she doubted he'd insist on seeing them. She'd spoken with Jake and Riley on the phone last night as they strategized with Charlie and Sam at the Cullens' place. Riley was grieving, believing he could never speak to his family again, knowing that they were mourning him as well. He wondered if he could leave a letter for them somehow, telling them he loved them. Or maybe he could call them on the phone and say that he'd joined a cult and would be moving to Greenland.

"Greenland?" Bella had said.

"Well, I don't know!" Riley said. "I just mean, I could tell them I'm going somewhere they can't follow, but not to worry about me."

Charlie, however, told Riley that would _not_ give his parents peace; they would likely try to find this "cult." And leaving a note might make his parents think his death was intentional. Wouldn't that break their hearts all over again?

"I just wish I could say goodbye."

If he were still a human being, Bella knew that the young man on the other end of the phone line would have tears his eyes.

"I don't know what to do either," Jake sighed after Riley passed him the phone. "Sam says we should somehow convince everyone that he's dead so the search can be called off. Charlie says the search will be called off anyway in two more days because of resources. But after that, volunteers might keep looking. It would be dangerous for them."

"It sounds like he has to be dead," Bella said quietly.

"Where there is life, there is hope," Jacob said.

"What?"

"It's from the Bible."

"You go to church?"

"Sometimes. You got a problem with that?"

"No. No, I just didn't know that."

As she remembered this conversation, riding in the truck with Emily and everyone, she reflected that she was learning all kinds of things about her friends lately. Angela had a giant ugly scar in her pants? Quil was suddenly obsessed with a three-year-old? Jacob went to _church?_ Holy crow. She didn't know if she could handle any more surprises.

"Where there is life, there is hope," Jacob had said. But then he added that he didn't know if Riley was alive anymore. He wanted to know what Bella thought.

"Maybe," she offered, "it's a different kind of life. I used to think it was a perfect life." Her cheeks felt hot as she said this, and imagining what Riley's parents were going through made her tear up, too. What would her transformation and disappearance have done to Charlie? "But now I—"

"I wish I was there with you," Jacob said quietly. "I would hug you."

She drew in a shaky breath. "Thank you. I don't think— I don't think there's any hope left for Riley."

"I'm coming," said Jacob. The phone line went dead. Bella went out the back door and sat on the steps until Jacob emerged from the woods. He was barefoot. They sat on the back steps and hugged as Bella confessed how her heart ached when she thought of her old desire to change. Jacob cried, too, just imagining her being gone. He tried to stop because he didn't want the pack to see him crying later, in his memory, and Bella said, "I hate the pack mind." She looked hard into Jacob's eyes. "You stay out of his head," she admonished the other wolves. "Quit looking in here. Paul. I mean you. Stupid Paul."

"Lay off Paul," said Jacob. "He got shot."

"Okay, Paul," said Bella, still staring into Jacob's dark eyes. "Sorry I called you stupid. But you are rude and vulgar and ought to mind your own business."

"You're egging him on," said Jacob. "He's just going to kick my ass."

"No one can kick your ass!" Bella growled, then blushed at her language. "No one can kick your can because you are the Alpha!"

"One of them."

"Now go away, everybody," she said firmly. "Quit looking in his head because I'm going to kiss him."

"Yeah. That's really going to make them bored with looking in here."

"Get out," said Bella. She leaned toward Jacob, put her hand over his eyes, and kissed his lips.

He kissed her back.

It was eight o'clock, but still somewhat light outside. Bella was still getting used to this aspect of living at a more northerly latitude. Shadows stretched over the lawn from the edge of the woods. The air was cool, and spring peepers were chirruping in the trees. Keeping her hand over Jacob's eyes meant she couldn't put her hand anywhere else.

"Do _not_ think about this later," she said. "Paul will kick—will _try_ to kick—your ass for crying, and I'll kick it for sharing private stuff."

"Either way, I lose," he sighed.

Bella wished the twilight gloom were darker. Then she realized— "Hey. It's really dark in the laundry room." She reached up, turned the doorknob, and the two of them rolled into the back porch. It was nearly completely black in there, the only window covered with heavy brown paper because Charlie thought it would prevent drafts. As Jacob kicked the door shut behind them, Bella banged her elbow on the clothes dryer.

"Ah, god, you're so cute," said Jacob, crawling toward her, kissing her elbow, then her upper arm, then shoulder, then lips.

"Why do you like that about me?" Bella mumbled.

He paused. In the dark room, finding each other by sound and touch, it seemed he could say things that were hard to say in the light. "I like to take care of you," he mumbled back. With his lips on her neck, he found the courage to say that he wanted her to need him, too.

"I do." She whispered a lot of other things that made her blush hot to say them. She _did_ need him. To help her learn to trust again. To be her sun. He mumbled more sweet things against her skin, including how he knew she was blushing because he could feel her cheeks get warmer, and she raised herself tall on her knees, kissing him harder, her heart pounding as she suddenly thought of how quickly this could end. He seemed to feel her fear.

"I won't," he said. "I just won't."

"You could see some girl and forget me instantly."

"No. I never could."

"It would break my heart. I didn't _need_ Edward; I just wanted him so bad, wanted him to love me."

"Shh. I am not breaking your heart."

"I _need_ you. I think this is wrong, somehow." The dark room, the feeling of his hands and lips, but not the sight of him watching her, allowed her to tremblingly confess her fears. "I should be more independent or something. But I'm not; I _need_ you; like maybe this isn't healthy."

"I don't care. I think of you before I sleep and as soon as I wake up. I want to be with you all the time. I need you to want me and love me."

"Don't cry."

"I can't go back to how we were before."

He raised himself on his knees, too, pulling her torso against his with one arm while his other hand touched her face to guide his kisses. She felt she couldn't have stood if she wanted to, she was shaking so bad. "This is weird and co-dependent and we're going to get hurt!" she wept.

"Yes, yes, and no." He raked his teeth over her neck.

She had not expected, when she twisted the doorknob, that they'd be tumbling into a dark cave that let all their emotions come creeping out of the tender, scared places in their hearts. It was like floating in outer space with only each other to cling to. It was hard to talk in between kisses and fierce embraces, and she had no idea how much time passed as they knelt in front of the washing machine, but she managed to tell him that sometimes, she was afraid he would die.

"I have claws."

And sometimes she was afraid that he couldn't need her as much as she needed him; that is, she needed him really, really bad. She tried to act normal, but—

"Really bad," he assured her. "Totally obsessed and sick and unhealthy, but there is no one else for me."

"But I might get clingy. Like with Edward."

"Funny how Ed rhymes with shred. Did I mention I have claws?"

The washing machine made a dull, metallic thump as he leaned her backward, bumping her head against it. It made her laugh, which felt equally intense in the near-total darkness.

"Why is your face red?" said Claire.

Bella was jerked back to an awareness of her present surroundings. The little girl was riding in a booster seat, sitting somewhat higher than Bella and Angela on either side. She was holding her small stuffed zebra and the black plastic spatula she used to style its hair. In her raised seat, her spatula brandished imperiously, she looked like a tiny queen.

Bella frowned at her.

Claire frowned back. "Why?" she stodgily repeated.

"Because it's hot in here," she grumbled. She tried to lower the window, but when she pressed the button, it wouldn't move. "Child locks," explained Emily, pressing a button on the driver's door that allowed her to move the window.

Claire set the blade of her spatula flat on Bella's cheek and said, "Tssss," as if she were flipping a burger in a hot pan.

Fortunately, they turned into the parking lot of the animal shelter just then. Gravel crunched under the tires as Emily pulled up to the building, a large pole barn painted blue. There was a white sign over the door with blue letters: Clallam County Wildlife Rehabilitation Center.

 _What? Oh, no….._

She had to eat her words. The animal shelter _did_ have skunks. Several. Two had bandaged paws. One looked mangey and skinny. The others looked okay, standing up on their rear legs to sniff at them through the bars of their cages.

"Oooooooh…" said Claire.

"Dammit, Leah," Bella whispered, smacking her arm. "Why did you have to tell her we were getting a skunk?"

"Because I like to fuck with you." Leah crossed her arms and leaned against a wall beside a poster of Washington wildlife.

The room was bright and airy, divided into different work areas by the arrangement of desks and cages. There was a sink in the back and a few freshly washed glass terrariums turned upside-down, drying on a countertop, an open window with a fan running in front of it, and a smell of cedar chips, animal excrement, and reptile. It was hard to explain what "reptile" smelled like, but Bella recognized the scent because it pulled up memories of Renee's many kindergarten class pets—lizards, tortoises, turtles—that had flourished in the classroom only to die mysteriously over summer vacation at Renee's house. After Bella turned eight, she saved them by simply remembering to feed them.

As Angela walked quietly down an aisle, peering at stinky reptiles, Emily lifted Claire onto her hip so she could see the skunks better. There were carrots and lettuce leaves in their cages. Some of the skunks paced back and forth in a way that made Bella want to wait in the lobby.

"Can I help you?" said a middle-aged man in a green polo shirt and khaki pants. He had a shiny, pink face, a bald head, a neatly-trimmed, long, white beard, and a bright smile. "Marvin," said his name tag.

"We're looking for a pet," said Emily. "A kitten."

"Skunk," said Claire. "A stripey skunk."

"A kitten," said Emily.

"Ho, ho, ho," Marvin chuckled. He seemed like the kind of person who would play Santa Claus in the winter. He pointed to an educational display on a table and explained that it was a traveling exhibit. He and his co-workers visited schools to teach kids about local wildlife and what to do if they saw an injured animal. Looking around the room again, Bella noticed a tall, brown owl in a large enclosure, a number of snakes in terrariums under heat lamps, and a spotted fawn, holding itself perfectly still under a desk the way it might have hidden under a bush. "Ho, ho," said Marvin. "We're not that kind of animal shelter. We help sick or injured wildlife. Take that fawn there."

Bella thought he must have noticed her looking at it.

"Its mother put it in a meadow and told it to stay put. But she never came back. Some neighbors found it at the back of their property. Watched it for two days, trying not to get too close. Human scent, you know. But the doe never came back. Poor critter."

"Awwww….." said Angela. "Can we pet it?"

"'Fraid not," said the man. "We're bottle feeding it, which is already too much human contact. It'll have to be released when it's weaned, and it needs to stay wary of people."

Angela looked wistfully at the baby animal, and Bella frowned and looked away. There had been a time when she'd felt like a deer. A prey species that the Cullens had ex-sanguinated and abandoned. But she'd always imagined herself, even in her darkest times, as an adult deer. Now here was a fawn, told by its mother to stay still and stay put, to be a good little fawn, and then the mother never came back. _Nice._ She did _not_ feel like standing here, staring at a helpless, abandoned baby animal.

"I'm waiting outside," she said.

Was this part of why she felt clingy with Jacob? Perhaps, she grimaced. But it was nice to know he didn't mind. Last night in the laundry room had been like peeling an onion of need, every layer revealing another pearly white, eye-stinging truth that was, depending on how you looked at it, magically romantic or edging on unhealthy: _I need you—I need you more—No, I need you more—No, I need YOU more…._ They also exchanged, in whispers, words of love and defiance: they didn't care what anyone said; they were going to be as clingy and clutching as they wanted because it felt good. At least, they acknowledged, it felt good right now. Maybe later their feelings would settle down.

"Okay," she had said, still kneeling, letting her head fall back against the washing machine. "This is good for now. You don't mind if I'm all needy?"

"God, no," he'd said, kissing her harder, pressing his body against hers. She felt smashed against the metal in a surprisingly delicious way. "You don't mind either?" he said, pulling aside the neck of her T-shirt to press his lips against her collarbone. "I can tell you these thoughts, and touch you like this, and—"

"Yes, yes, yes, yes…."

How amazing it felt to be so open about her emotions. How reassuring to know he felt the same. How fantastic to be crushed against the cool metal surface of a large home appliance. It was as if their feelings were solidifying into a dense, weighty sphere, a fist of titanium, heavy enough to have its own gravitational force, like a tiny, gunmetal gray blackhole.

 _I need you to need me,_ he had confessed. This truth had come to him earlier this week, he said. He just hoped she wouldn't think that it was a weakness or that he would be anything other than completely strong for her, despite being helplessly ruled by his need for her to need him. Bella had taken his face in her hands and looked into the space where she thought his eyes were—it was utterly dark in there—and felt a small thrill as she told him what she hoped would reassure him forever: _I will never stop needing you._

 _"_ Wow," he'd said. "That's kind of disgusting." He touched her forehead with his index finger, right between her eyebrows, and said, "I knew you'd be frowning." He kissed away the wrinkle there, and kissed her lips, and her neck, and in spite of herself she melted to the floor and he followed.

"Sorry about all this laundry," she had said. "Some of it is dirty."

"I love it. It smells like you." After a pause to toss a few things behind him—"These ones smell like Charlie"—he stretched himself beside her, holding his weight on his elbows, and found her lips. He kissed her neck and shoulders and forehead, too. "I've dreamed of this," he whispered.

"Laundry?" she teased.

"No." Kiss. "No." Kiss. "Not at all."

They kissed until tingles spread through her body. She wondered if he felt the same. She hoped he did. She put one hand on his sternum, feather-light, and the other in the close-cut hair on the back of his head. When he made a whimper into her mouth, she _knew_ he felt it. Rocking onto his left elbow, he freed his right hand to stroke the side of her face. She lifted her head, hoping he'd put his lips on her neck again, but instead he slid a knee between her legs.

It made her stiffen, not with apprehension, but with surprise. He froze, sensing her stillness. They stared at one another, as much as they could in the dark room.

"Oh, my god," he whispered. "I'm s—"

"No!" she said.

"Please." He tugged on her arms until she sat up with him. Kissing her again, gently, he said, "This is scary."

"No."

"Scary good."

When she tucked her head under his chin and kissed his neck, she could feel him shivering. "Why?"

Gently, he took her hand and guided it down his torso, down and down, until she felt her fingers brush, through his jeans, something new.

"I can't help it," he whispered.

Wondrously, she stroked her index finger over the fabric there. Her best friend. She was discovering this with him.

"Oh, my god, please stop that," he whispered. He stood up, pulling her to her feet as well, and twined their fingers together on both hands, backing her against a wall and kissing her again, softly at first, then with a hard urgency, holding her hands over her head and pressing them to the wall. Just as quickly, he pulled back. "I have to go…." And he was out the door, jogging into the trees, shaking his hands, rolling his head to stretch his neck.

Bella had watched him go. Her body was on fire. And his body— She hadn't thought that would happen, hadn't thought of it at all, like— ever. Oh, Jacob, her sweet Jacob! Had he been called away, or had he been embarrassed?

Biting her lip, she leaned against the building and looked up at the cloudless sky. They'd been rolling in a pile of her underwear, the exact same stuff that had spilled from her dresser in an excruciatingly awkward white waterfall a few days ago, and if she had felt embarrassed about _that,_ then maybe Jacob... Oh, she wouldn't have thought it of him, but maybe, deep down, he was kind of ... shy?

 _We are the same,_ she thought. More and more. Even his compulsive cleaning of engine parts and the way he arranged them on a towel on the garage floor according to size. He could take on the Alpha thing, and the Chief-in-Training thing, and be the model student, and be friendly to everyone in town—part of the job, Billy would say, charming Billy, charismatic, controlling Billy—and yet he'd freeze and run away from what happened in the laundry room. It made her love him more. _As if that were_ _possible!_ It made her think that if he could be shy _and_ a leader, then maybe she could, someday, do those things, too. Like speak to a crowd. Make decisions. _We are the same._ She tried to think of what she'd want him to say to her, if their positions were reversed.

Soon the others came outside, Emily still carrying Claire on her hip. Claire was crying about not being able to adopt a skunk.

"We should not have come here," Emily frowned.

"I'm sorry," Bella said. "I didn't know it was the wrong kind of shelter."

Angela offered to hold Claire, but she just clung harder to Emily's neck. Leah held open the truck's door, but Claire didn't want to go inside.

From the highway, Bella saw a silver, severely dented minivan approaching, and then the van pulled into the shelter's parking lot and Quil hopped out. Angela looked startled and edged closer to Bella, who instinctively stepped in front of her friend. Though she knew he hadn't meant to, Quil had hurt Angela's feelings.

Dressed in his Newton's Outfitters white polo shirt, clean jeans, and mostly mud-free boots, he wore no coat and his face was flushed. Slamming the van's door behind him, he shook his hands as if they were wet. He was breathing heavily and his eyes were darting around the perimeters of the parking lot. Claire stopped crying and regarded him suspiciously.

"What are you doing here?" snapped Emily. "Everything is fine."

"I was just passing by."

"You were not. You're supposed to be at work."

"Lunch break."

Emily asked Leah to get Claire buckled into her carseat, and Leah asked Angela if she knew how to do that. The two of them leaned into the backseat, trying to find and fasten the right clips, as Emily took Quil's elbow and steered him back to his van. "Everything is fine," she repeated. "Don't get fired."

Quil's hands were trembling. "I can't stand it," he whispered. "Please let me come with you."

"No. You have to work so we can eat. And you have to let her be a normal little girl."

"Nothing is normal anymore!" he cried. "Bella?"

She had never seen him so upset. Not even when they'd thought that Jacob had been kidnapped by Sam and his wolf monster. His eyes were red; his skin was clammy and pale. He gave a tiny, strangled cry and put his fist in his mouth.

The imprint. Bella remembered. If it happened to Jacob, could he be stronger than this? Happy-go-lucky Quil was a mess, but she thought—she really did, after last night—that Jacob had a shot at resistance. Emily, however, thought that Quil could _not_ resist. She seemed to think she ought to help him along.

"You just stop feeling this way," she hissed. "Stop it!"

"Like Sam?" he countered. "You think this thing can be fought?"

"If you care about her, you'll stop caring about her!"

"Aunt Emily?" came Claire's little voice from the truck, and tears sprang to Quil's eyes.

"Just tell me where you're going," he begged. "So I can know she's safe."

"She with me, so she's safe." Emily stalked back to the truck.

Closing his eyes, Quil leaned against the side of his van and put his hand over his chest. His shoulders seemed to shimmer, like hot air over asphalt.

"Do you have creepy feelings for this kid?" said Bella. She had to ask.

"No!" Quil clapped both hands over his mouth and shuddered as if nauseated.

Bella looked over her shoulder. Through the windshield, Emily was glaring at her. "Port Angeles," she whispered. "Humane Society. We're getting her a kitten."

"Oh," he said, squeezing his eyes shut against tears. "Thank you."

* * *

For the past three mornings, Paul had awakened on Embry's living room sofa—or, to be more precise, on Tiffany Call's sofa. Each time, he feigned sleep while he assessed his surroundings, and as soon as he was sure he was alone in the room, he vaulted out the window.

The first time he'd done this, he had slipped to a knee, but after two more days he was landing gracefully upright. The air felt good. Cool and misty. It soothed his burning skin. In the cover of the woods, he could rest more, curled on moss. It felt good to have his nose closer to the dirt. Old Quil's garden had ripe cabbages and carrots at this time of year. There were mushrooms in the woods, but he didn't know which ones were safe.

Two days ago, someone had gone to his house and retrieved some of his clothes, his school books, and his toothbrush. Now his things smelled like Embry had touched them. But they didn't smell like Embry usually smelled, which was salty, sharp, sweaty, and self-loathing. These things smelled like Embry without the loathing. The scent was almost unrecognizable, as if an unknown animal had run his father's gauntlet. It was a shame because Paul wasn't going to wear any of those clothes.

His stomach cramped now as he rested with his back against Old Quil's shed. Three days of eating nothing but vegetables was having a bad effect on his digestion. He wished he could stay awake long enough to get dinner at Sam's house. Emily usually made something savory and hot, if singed. He also wished he could phase so he could catch some game. He didn't mind eating raw; he didn't even mind the bones, teeth, feathers, or fur. They were crunchy. They looked good cracking between his teeth while the others averted their eyes. But he could neither stay awake nor phase. The one time he'd tried, his wound had opened. Sam and Jake had Ordered him to remain in his first form, and he was too weak to fight them both. So here he was again, half-sick on vegetables with a vampire's luxury item slowly absorbed by his skin. The silky fibers of the cashmere sweater were matted with his blood, and his blood was tainted with the same. As soon as he could think straight, he'd exchange this ridiculous sling for something from La Push. Anything. A fucking plastic bag from the general store.

Would a regular person have died from this wound? Probably. Would Paul? Probably not, if only because he had a goal. He wanted to live long enough to beat or claw the smirk off Jake's face. Ordering him to remain unphased was only Jake's second Order, and the first one he'd performed without yelling, and it had worked. It happened yesterday evening, after they'd found him curled in a wolf's position and partly in his human body, bleeding again, under Sam's back porch. There were a lot of spiders under there and some skunks, but they had scurried away when he raised a lip and growled. He'd thought he could sleep under there, warm in his fur, till he smelled dinner, but no, Ellen Uley ratted him out. Scary witch. She had smelled him or something. Soon the rest of the pack was up in his business.

"Come on, man," said Jared, leaning to peer under the porch. "You ain't a porch dog. Ain't like one of them hillbilly cautionary tales about if your porch caves in and kills more'n five dogs, then you might be a redneck."

Paul, half-conscious and halfway between forms, snarled at him.

"I didn't know you could talk like a hillbilly," said Quil to Jared. "What would you call that accent?"

"I don't know. I learned it on the radio," said Jared. "Country music station. Some of the singers sound like this."

"Heh-heh," said Quil. "Do it again."

"Porch dog," said Jared. The word "dog" came out really slowly, like _dowwwww-g._

The rest of the boys cracked up. Ellen came carefully down the porch steps, using a cane, and Sam's mother came out, too.

"Sam," she said, "I told you to put up some netting around the bottom of the porch. Is there another animal under there?"

"It's just Paul," grumbled Sam.

"Paul!" said Allison sharply. "You get on out from there." She pointed at the grass beside the steps. "Out!" Then she leaned over, like Jared, and peered into the gloom. "Oh, my god! What's that?"

"It's just Paul," grumbled Sam again. "He's stuck in the middle."

Allison shivered and backed away.

Closing his eyes, Paul channeled all of his energy into repulsiveness. He felt stuck in a red, fleshy blob, hairy and dirty, wet and sticky, brown skin blurred, half-furred. He would not have wanted to look in the mirror, not even for curiosity's sake. This was why phasing with a bang was best. Not the slow way, like when Embry had dragged Jacob between worlds too soon. He wished Embry would stop thinking about that. It was so, so tiresome to see the new co-Alpha's body flashing through everyone's minds, unbidden, in a state of— a state of— of something unreal, inside out, fetal, feral. Sort of like how Paul looked now, except that Jacob hadn't been able to settle on a form for six agonizing hours, and Jacob hadn't been the grit-his-teeth-and-shut-up-about-it kind of person. Embry's aural memory was just as irritating, forced on them when they phased. Paul, however, could take it. Sure, he was slumped under Sam's porch, halfway through the change, too tired and sick to complete it, but it didn't hurt anymore, and he wasn't hollering about it.

"Pick one or the other, man," said Jared.

"Say it like a hillbilly," said Quil.

"Ain' no call a-lie there a-lookin' like that."

"I think he's bleeding again," said Embry. "Look at the dirt near his arm. It's getting darker."

Paul thought Embry ought to be with Riley. _Somebody_ ought to be with Riley. Shit, was it supposed to be _him_? He couldn't remember. He moved a paw or hand or pink appendage to raise himself, his body moving toward duty though his mind moved toward the earth, his consciousness fading, and his limb slipped.

"Riley's up north sucking on a seal," said Embry. "He's fine."

"Ew," said Quil.

Paul didn't know if that "ew" was meant for his slimy, half-formed body or the idea of sucking on a seal. He could hear Sam assess and comment on his condition. It sounded like this: " ….. " because Sam didn't use words when his meaning could be conveyed with a frown.

"As yer Beta," said Jared, though the word came out like _betta,_ "I'm 'a urge you not to dick around a'tween bodies."

"He should pick a form that Sue can work with," said Embry.

"Sh'ain' no vet," said the Betta.

Paul sighed, exhausted and sick. He could practically feel the pressure of Jacob Black's lips pressed together in a hard, flat line, the expression he assumed when he was either A) trying to keep his temper or B) trying to make a decision. Sure enough: "Paul, uh, I Order you to remain human."

"Specify the duration," said Sam.

"Till we say so," said Jacob.

"Nice touch."

Paul's body slid into a weak, brown, thin thing that he hated, and there it stayed. Blood on his upper half. Blood in his ear where his head lay on the ground. Blood on the side of his face.

"It worked!" Jacob sounded surprised.

"Of course it worked."

"Huh. Sam, I Order you to stand on one foot."

"Not going to work."

"Quil, I Order you to stand on one foot. Ha! It worked!"

 _Shut up, shut up, shut up, you stupid, spoiled chief-baby,_ thought Paul. Then Jared tugged on his ankles, dragging him into daylight, causing him to cry out and lose consciousness. When he woke, he was in Sam's bathtub, warm water up to his armpits, Sam holding his head up while Emily bathed him. "No," he moaned, but Emily said, "Shh." After that he didn't remember anything till he woke again on Tiffany's couch, ravenous and confined.

Now, on Saturday morning, as he leaned against Old Quil's shed and gnawed carrot after carrot, he felt that he wanted to kill something, but the only thing he had access to destroy was himself. As if in answer or recognition, a tendril of pale blue smoke came creeping over the ground like a snake scenting prey. As it approached, Paul felt a numbness in his shoulder and brain, like novocaine. "Go away, you freaky runt," he growled, and the smoke became the white seeds of a dandelion puff, blown away. The pain returned.

* * *

"Hey, look. Elk," said Leah as they passed a meadow north of Forks where one of the Park's resident herds of Roosevelt elk often grazed. "Claire, look, there's some elk." But Claire was asleep. Her head was lolled back against her booster seat and her mouth was open.

Angela had her head cocked to one side, staring at the girl. "Awww," she said, very quietly. She pointed at Claire's tiny, upturned nose, her delicate black eyelashes, and her sweaty hair stuck to her forehead, then she looked at Bella as if seeking a mirror for her adoration. Bella shrugged. It took some effort to keep her face impassive when she was thinking, _Ew, a kid._ "Look at her little fingernails!" whispered Angela. _Yes, yes,_ thought Bella. _She's got ten of them._ She nodded to at least acknowledge Angela's comment, and the four women and the girl rolled north on Highway 101 toward Port Angeles. Lake Crescent was especially beautiful today, they remarked, under a bright blue spring sky with the water flat and still. Sam's truck was very clean and comfortable, and way nicer on the inside, thought Bella, remembering how the only other time she'd ridden in it was right after she discovered the wolves and was covered with swamp mud, freezing in the truck bed on the way back to town.

"I don't know if I can have kids," said Angela suddenly.

"What?"

"My scar. What if it won't stretch when I'm pregnant?"

Emily glanced at her in the rearview mirror. "It's not so bad."

"What if it won't stretch and something bad happens to the baby? Or what if I can't get pregnant in the first place because no one wants to get close to my scar? It's kind of right next to an important place."

"An important place?" said Leah. She spoke to an imaginary lover in a sexy, breathy voice, saying, "Ooh, babe, come upstairs and I'll show you my important place."

"Shut up," said Bella. Two months ago, she would never have been able to say those words to Leah, but now she felt comfortable enough with her new friend to defend her old one. "I _t is_ an important place."

"Maybe this is why Ben—"

"Shut up," said Bella again, this time to her old friend. "If he looked at that and ran, then he is worse of a jerk than I thought."

"Ooh, babe," said Leah, this time in a deep voice like a man's, "your important place looks extra tough."

"Tough?" said Angela.

"Not unattractive tough," said Leah in her man voice. "More like, uh, strong. I want to fill it with mah babies."

Emily snorted. "Baby-shield tough."

Angela did not look convinced.

"Here," said Emily, taking one hand off the wheel to dig in her purse in the center console. "Put this stuff on it." She passed Angela a jar Bella had seen before, a jar that Ellen Uley had given to Emily while smearing green goop on her face. When Angela unscrewed the lid, it smelled just as horrible as Bella remembered: like gasoline and grass clippings.

"What is it?" said Angela, wrinkling her nose.

"I don't know. Ellen gave it to me. Sam's great-grandma."

The stuff looked so old, in its battered tin jar, that Bella wondered if Sam's great-grandma had gotten it from her own great-grandma. _Yikes._

"She told me to put it on my scars, and it might help. I think they're less red lately."

Angela said she'd try it, dipping one fingertip into the goop.

"But don't get any in your eyes," added Emily. "Don't forget it's on your hand and wipe your eye because it stings like a bi— stings very bad."

"I swear," said Leah, "you're as bad as Bella."

Bella looked at Emily in the rearview mirror, the two of them narrowing their eyes, and she knew they were thinking the same thought, one that didn't require any curse words to express it: "Leah is a stinker."

* * *

The girls stopped at a diner in Port Angeles so Claire could have a grilled cheese sandwich and a glass of milk. The others had Cokes and shared an order of French fries. Bella considered ordering a cheeseburger but knew she ought to save her pennies to buy the kitten. When Emily said that they could stop at a pet shop on their way to the Humane Society, Bella frowned as she realized that she also needed to buy cat food, a collar, a litter box, litter, and flea repellant.

The waiter dropped off their check, staring at Emily's scars, which made Bella frown more. Emily let her hair fall over her face and turned her head away, and Leah, as they left, took a huge gob of chewing gum from her mouth and fastened the twenty dollar bill they'd paid with to the table.

At the pet shop, Bella used a plastic litter box as a shopping basket, filling it with the cat supplies she deemed the barest necessities. Claire followed her through the aisles, dragging a plastic stick with a sprig of feathers tied to a string. "Put it back," whispered Bella, and the girl stared up at her without blinking until Emily caught up with them, saying, "No, no, no. You're getting it dirty." She plopped it in the box Bella carried, and Claire took this as permission to get more. Mutely, she trotted back and forth from a display of toys, choosing stuffed mice, a fish made of crackling fabric, a sparkly pink collar, a silver bell for it, and a packet of catnip.

"This?" she said at last, sniffing the green herb.

"It's weed," Leah explained. "Cats smoke it."

"They do not," said Emily.

"Weed for cats," said Leah.

Claire squatted on the floor and held out the package to an imaginary cat, whispering, "Want some weed?"

"Give me that." Emily put it back on the shelf, and when she walked away, Leah put it back in Bella's box. _Dammit,_ thought Bella, _I'm the one who's paying for all of this._

At the cash register, an older woman cooed at Claire, calling her a lucky sweetie and instructing her to be a good cat mommy. The word made Claire's eyes fill with tears. "Shh," said Emily, carrying her outside. "Her mommy is sick," Leah explained to the apologetic cashier. Angela helpfully heaved a box of cat litter onto the counter, and Bella, wondering why anyone had to pay for little rocks in a box, handed over nearly a hundred dollars.

As they pulled out of the parking lot in Sam's truck, Bella noticed a silver Nissan Quest minivan following them.

* * *

Jake, Jared, and Sam spent most of Saturday stalking prey. Or at least, that's what it felt like to Jacob. As sneakily as possible, they followed the party of Forksians who felt it was their business—their obligation—to search the woods for the wolf pack that had killed the white mare. This was how Forks looked after its own. With rifles. Jacob hoped no one would get hurt accidentally. Jared scouted about a half mile ahead of the search party as Jake and Sam flanked it to the rear. As the morning wore on and nothing happened, Jacob began to wish he were home in bed. Mostly the men kept to the trail because slogging through the bushes, trees, and ferns—like us, grumbled Jacob—was slow and difficult. He knew he should be thankful that this job was dull, padding silently through the forest, keeping out of sight, but he hadn't slept well for weeks. The last time he'd felt anywhere near well rested had been in Bella's bed, the morning after the pack spared Riley.

Bella… So often, her eyes looked hunted, haunted, or just plain hurt and scared. Secretly, he suspected she was a pessimist. He supposed she had reasons for that. One of the things he loved best was to make her smile. Or to _feel_ her smile under his fingertips, or under his lips, like last night.

Last night in her laundry room had been…. Well…. It was hard to keep his mind on the forest, Charlie, and the men he was supposed to protect. He remembered what it felt like to have her talking into his mouth, her lips and tongue and breath, her trembling hands, as they clutched each other, both babbling words that would have been impossible to say in broad daylight. He was kissing her, and she couldn't stop telling him all the things she worried about—they were mostly the same things _he_ worried about—and in his relief, in his rush to tell her everything, they'd been talking through their kisses. Wonderful and strange. It made a stabbing pang in his gut. Now he looked at his brownish red, furred feet padding over the moss. Soft and cool on his paw pads. How would the moss feel on his bare skin, he wondered. On his bare, human skin. Or hers.

He sensed black frown of the other Alpha. Look at this, said Sam. Through the black wolf's eyes, and through Jared's eyes as they, too, shared this vision, he saw a long, narrow stretch of broken branches and torn up earth, like the path of a tiny tornado, running east-west.

Holy— What is that?

It's _us,_ said Sam. Us running back to the Cullens' place after the horse problem with Riley and Paul.

Jared and Jacob looked glumly at the mess they'd made.

How are we supposed to keep people from finding this? said Sam.

It's not on the trail, Jake offered. They probably won't go over there.

"I got a print," called one of the hunters, bending over a muddy spot on the trail.

Shit, said Sam.

Jacob, closest to the print, closed his eyes and lowered his nose. It was faint, but he caught enough scent to reassure the others that it was just Embry's. Jacob estimated the scent was two or three days old.

At least it was Embry's, said Sam. At least he's a runt for a reason.

He's not a runt, said Jacob.

Haven't you ever wondered why—

No.

"Wolf print?" called another hunter.

"Yep," said the first.

The hunters left the trail and fanned out from the print, looking for more. They made loud noises, cracking fallen branches underfoot and rustling more branches as they bent them to pass by and let them loose to spray dew everywhere. For Jacob, who had been straining his ears all morning, the sounds were startling enough that he shook his head, his fur standing up as shivers rolled down his spine. He wanted to laugh. One minute he was listening to the wind whine between needles at the top of a Sitka spruce and the humble scraping of a banana slug's radula in the leaf litter; the next minute, his sensitive ears were bombarded with the clumsiness of thirty hunters. And these were _quiet_ people, he knew. People who were used to the woods.

Dude, you got two of them coming your way, said Jared to Sam.

Sam turned his black frown to Jacob again, saying, Do something.

With a sigh, Jacob lifted his muzzle and lazily said, "Awooooooo."

Instantly, the hunters changed direction. Jake became the scout then, and Jared and Sam fell in to flank on the east and west. Wind blew their scent north to him: coffee, cigarettes, body odor, a lot of whiskey, barrel oil, bacon, and maple syrup, probably from someone's breakfast.

Phew, said Jacob, wishing the whiskey smell would blow some other direction. It was sharp and strong. Who has whiskey for breakfast? he complained. It's not even noon.

A bit judgmental there, aren't we? said Jared.

I'm just saying, returned Jacob, that it's kind of early in the day to be loaded and carrying a rifle.

So later in the day, that would be okay?

No. I'm just saying—

Hey. I just thought of this. The guy is loaded and the rifle is loaded. That's two kinds of loaded. Ha ha.

Shut up, said Sam. You are making my head hurt.

The wolves spent another hour leading the men north. While the hunters stopped for a lunch break, the wolves looked for food, too. Jared found some pale mushrooms, which he chomped open-mouthed before Sam could ask if they were safe to eat, and a large, gray moth. Jacob watched, mystified, as the sandy brown wolf startled the moth where it was resting on a tree trunk. The moth fluttered upward, and the wolf leaped after it, jaws snapping, tail wagging, pink tongue lolling as he circled beneath it. Sunlight slanted through the branches. The brown wolf fell on his back, rolling, shaking himself, twisting his spine and scratching his shoulders on the earth. With one more leap, it pawed the moth and sent it higher, out of reach, then sat on its haunches and watched it till it disappeared high in the pines.

Jared? said Sam. Jared?

Sometimes it seemed to Jacob that Jared wasn't in there anymore.

* * *

The pet shelter smelled so bad. Urine, feces, fur, disinfectant. Ammonia. Bella put her hand over her nose as she, the other girls, and Claire passed through the door to the cat area. Dogs were on the other side of the building. A volunteer led them down a hall—a Hall of Cats, thought Bella—lined with stacked silver cages, each containing one cat and an informative tag. "Chester," said one, referring to an extremely large, round, yellow striped cat with green eyes. If cats could be considered overweight, this one was obese. "12 years old. Neutered. Bites." Emily stood in front of that cage so Claire wouldn't develop an interest in Chester.

"We'll need you to fill out an application," said the volunteer, a gray-haired woman in a blue Humane Society T-shirt. "The papers are in the lobby. And if you would like to hold any cats, just let me know."

Emily went to the lobby, and Bella took her place in front of Chester's cage, hoping he wouldn't snag her sweater or try to bite her.

"It stinks in here," she whispered to Angela, but Angela didn't notice; she was slowly drifting down the hall, peering into each cage, looking, Bella supposed, for love. Maybe she could be more supportive.

"Here," she said to Leah. "Stand here."

Leah didn't feel like surreptitiously censoring Claire's cat adoption experience. "See this cat?" she said forthrightly. "It bites. You can't have it." Claire was leery enough of her cousin to silently step back.

Trailing after Angela, Bella looked at the cats. Which one would love and cuddle her friend? The shelter volunteer allowed Angela to open the cages and pet the cats. She was very gentle, even holding some of the cats in her arms to hug them, but the cats pushed on her chest with their paws and strained their heads away from her. The volunteer said that most of these cats didn't get enough socialization to enjoy hugs. Some didn't like to be picked up at all. "Except for Chester," she said. "He's very affectionate. Sort of."

"Why he bite?" said Claire.

"His owner declawed him," said the volunteer. "He started biting to defend himself in a different way. That's how he ended up here."

Claire stared at Chester.

"No," said Leah.

"It's illegal to declaw cats in Europe, Brazil, Australia, New Zealand…." Bella stopped listening as the volunteer rattled off a long list of countries that consider declawing a form of animal cruelty because it amputates the first joints of the cat's toes.

"Awww….." said Angela. "Poor baby." She opened Chester's cage and scratched his ears, and the cat stretched his neck to put his teeth on Angela's fingers.

"See there?" said the volunteer. "He's not really biting you. That's a warning. He's just telling you he doesn't like you."

 _Charming,_ thought Bella.

"Hey, Claire," said Leah. "Look at these kittens."

Emily poked her head into the cat area and asked Bella to come to the lobby. "Can you finish filling this out?" she asked. She had arranged to meet her sister Julie and their mother here while Claire chose a kitten. They were out in the parking lot now. Bella took the adoption papers and found a table and pen. The form was surprisingly complicated, with questions about the adoptive owner's household members, dwelling place, vet access, finances, and experience with animals. _Geez,_ she thought, frowning at the secretary, _Do you or don't you want to get these pets out of here?_ She filled out as much as she could, assuming the kitten would live in Sam's household, and made up the answers she didn't know. Then, to be helpful, she filled out papers for Angela, too. She gave them all to the secretary and took a seat near a window that looked onto the parking lot.

There was a copy of _Cat Fancy_ magazine on the windowsill. She was bored enough to flip through it, looking at the pictures. As she was debating whether or not she was bored enough to actually read an article called "Hope for Hairball Horrors," a movement in the parking lot caught her eye.

It was Emily's sister. Julie was circling her car, a small, older model black Ford Escort, while their mother, a tall woman with brown hair held up in a clip, kept trying to cut her off, circling in the opposite direction. It was an anxious dance, and Julie had her hands cupped over her nose and mouth as if it were hard to breathe. Her eyes were very wide. Emily stood still, holding the handle of a baby's carseat. The baby was asleep, tucked under a yellow blanket. None of the women noticed a silver Nissan minivan slip into a parking spot on the far side of the lot.

The door to the Hall of Cats opened. Leah came out with a cardboard cat carrier box. "Sorry about this," she said. "We're only allowed to adopt kittens in pairs." She set the box on the floor and opened it. Two black and white kittens peered up at the girls. _Surprise, surprise,_ thought Bella. _They're skunk-colored._ One of them played with Leah's braid as she leaned over the box.

"Please tell me this is a two-for-one deal," said Bella.

"Sorry again."

There went seventy dollars.

"Oh, no," said Leah. She was looking out the window.

Bella watched as she went outside, hugged her aunt, and began transferring baby clothes, diapers, bottles, formula, toys, and blankets to a cargo box in the back of Sam's truck. Emily stood still, her face pale.

Whatever was happening out there made Bella feel that grumbling over the cost of the kittens was shameful. She fastened the flaps on the box and took out her checkbook. As she was paying the adoption fee, Claire toddled out from the Hall of Cats carrying the enormous yellow tabby. She had her arms around Chester's ribcage. His front legs stuck straight out as the rest of his heavy body hung limply against her torso. His eyes were narrowed in a cat-like frown and his fat tail dragged on the floor, but he wasn't biting.

"Him, too," said Claire.

Bella allowed herself one sigh. "How much?" she asked the secretary.

"That one is free."

"Thank you."

Chester did not want to be lowered into a cat carrier box. He stuck out his legs and pushed against the rim. Bella tried pushing on his back, but he hissed at her. When Claire set him on the floor, he resumed his puddle-like shape.

 _Your mom is in the parking lot_ , thought Bella. Something told her she should not speak it. The volunteer came out and lay the carrier on its side, placing a treat in the back. Chester looked at her. She added a second treat. Claire offered a third. "This little girl wants to adopt you, you big dummy," said the volunteer. "Now scoot." She put three more treats in the back of the box, and when Chester still didn't move, she upended the entire bag. Very slowly, the cat slunk into the box. It was barely big enough for him.

 _We're going to have to buy more food at the pet store on the way home._

Crawling on her knees, Claire began to slid the heavy box toward the door. What happened next made Bella think that three years old was awfully young to have a broken heart.

* * *

God, this is so _boring,_ thought Jacob. He, Sam, Jared, and the hunters had been wading through the brush for nearly five hours. His mind drifted to his moments with Bella in her laundry room. _Laundry._ Laundry everywhere. On the floor. In baskets they tipped over. One basket had been full of towels warm from the dryer; Bella must have just finished folding them before he came. They tipped that over too, making them shiver with delight at the combination of the warm towels and the cool linoleum floor, the floor which was soon covered with laundry. All he could smell was Fells Naphtha soap and Bella, Bella, Bella. The floor became a soft pile of her scent and he pressed her into it, stretching his body on top of hers for the first time. He thought of all the things that might be in that pile, things that had intimately touched her skin and felt her warmth all day. If only he hadn't messed it up. What if he'd scared her? Or worse, repulsed her? The thought made him want to run and run, to run until he was too exhausted to feel anymore.

Where's Quil? said Embry.

Jacob's attention was pulled back to the pack, and he cursed himself for thinking about Bella while phased. Sneakily, he tried to peek into the other wolves' minds to see if they'd been peeking into his. It seemed he'd escaped with his privacy intact. Shifting his focus to Embry, he could see gray sand and smooth, gray and brown beach stones between his front paws. His brother was lying like a sphinx on the beach far north of La Push.

Quil is supposed to take over for me, said Embry, and through his brother's eyes Jacob could see Riley, lying on his back with half of his body in the surf. The drained carcasses of six seals lay beside him like deflated black balloons as Riley's body rocked gently in the waves.

What's he doing? asked Jacob.

Practicing.

For what?

For tomorrow. He's got a plan.

Do I want to know this plan?

You'll have to. Tomorrow. And where's Quil?

He's at work, said Sam. In Forks.

I don't think so, said Embry. He's farther away than that.

Dark tentacles of doubt seeped from Sam's mind, spreading his unease to the others. His wordless message: Something is wrong with Embry; his mind is coming apart and moving in too many directions.

Nothing's wrong with him, said Jacob, though he, too, had to admit he was creeped out occasionally.

Leave him alone, said Jared, but it was too late. Embry had already left _them_ alone, his mental connection fading. The last thing Jacob saw was the sun burning on the water, the reflected light stinging his brother's eyes. Or were his eyes stinging for a different reason?

Emb? said Jacob, and then, Dammit, Sam, you're supposed to build us up. Make us feel confident and connected. You're the Alpha.

So are you.

Ohhhhmmm….. intoned Jared. He sounded like a big bell, sending the others an image of his mother, a yoga teacher, sitting in lotus position on a blanket in their yard. She was breathing deeply, her palms upturned on her knees, her middle fingers gently touching her thumbs. Ohhhhhmmmm…..

Sam's and Jacob's minds went blank with stupefaction.

Breathe man, said Jared. Ohhhhhmmmmmm…

Jacob detected in Sam's mind a squelched impulse to say, Fuck off. Instead, Sam said, Fine, and took a deep breath.

Ohm, said Jacob.

No, man, Ohhhhhmmmmm…

Ohm.

Close enough. I invite you into my head, said Jared grandly, as if he were showing them a room behind a curtain. The Alphas let themselves pass through a heavy green barrier of leaves to see through Jared's eyes, and his eyes were eyes of moss. His eyes were lichen, moss, mushroom and moth. His breath, wind in cedars. His paws, leaf litter. His tongue, glacial water pouring into rivers.

I see nothing, said Sam.

Ohm? said Jacob.

Look harder, said Jared. Or rather, look softer.

A quiet crackling sound came from Sam's head: the result of a thousand tiny assumptions shattering.

* * *

Bella stared at the highway as she rode home with Emily, Leah, Claire, and Claire's baby brother Jeremy in Sam's truck. She was sitting in the front seat. Leah drove, and Emily sat in the backseat with the children. "Relax," said Leah, and Bella realized that she'd been sitting bolt upright for miles, watching the dashed yellow lines in the center of the road whiz at her face and vanish under the truck. "What's happening?" she whispered, and Leah whispered back, "I don't know."

Jeremy was two months old. He couldn't hold up his head yet. He had begun to squall in the parking lot of the Humane Society, and Emily had popped a pacifier in his mouth and clipped his carseat into the backseat of the truck. Then she had tried to help Claire.

Poor Claire, thought Bella.

When Claire had shoved the carrier containing her new, humongous cat through the shelter's door, she had seen her mother and grandmother in the parking lot. Bella was left to carry the kittens' and the cat's boxes as Claire ran to them, shrieking, "Mommy, Mommy, Mommy!" and Julie burst into tears, clutching Claire in a hug as the girl cried, too. Claire touched her mother's face and sobbed, "I want to go home." It made Julie cry more.

"Not yet, honey," said Claire's grandmother. This was Sue Clearwater's sister, Bella remembered.

Claire cried and cried. Silently, Emily loaded the two boxes of cats into the truck, placing them in the footwells of the backseat.

"I brought you your doll," said Julie. "And your other zebra. They're in—where, Leah?—they're in the box there."

Claire didn't care where those toys were.

"I'm sorry," wept Julie.

It was so awful that Bella felt she ought to look away. Somebody's mother was unable to take care of a little girl. Of a little fawn. She sidled closer to Leah as if the other girl's strength could somehow help her.

The baby spat out his pacifier and squalled again, a bleating, ragged cry that made Julie hyperventilate. "Oh, no, oh, no!" she cried. "Somebody help him!"

"He's just hungry, honey," said Julie's mother. "Emily can help him. She can. Yes, she can." From a quilted pink diaper bag on her shoulder, she pulled out a half-empty bottle of white formula. Quickly, Emily stuck it in the baby's mouth and said, "See? He's okay. Everything is okay." Emily had to lean halfway into the truck to hold the bottle up so the baby wouldn't ingest air.

"Emily can take care of everything," said their mother. "And I'm going to take care of you." Julie looked at her mother with the same expression that Claire had on her face, a look that said, _Save me._ "Julie, you need rest. Lots of sleep. You need to eat something."

"No!"

"It's just for a few days, honey. This is an emergency. Let me take care of you. Emily can take care of the kids."

"No!"

Emily caught her mother's eye and made a tiny shooing motion. "Mommy has to go," she told Claire.

"I'll come get you soon," said Julie unsteadily. "Just as soon as I can. Be a good girl for Aunt Emily."

"She's always good," Emily said. Leah took the bottle from her and held it for the baby as Emily gently tried to peel Claire off of her mother.

"No, no, no, no, no!" wailed Claire.

Julie's mother helped detach Claire and urged her older daughter toward their car. As they drove away, Bella saw Julie put her hands over her face.

Claire began to scream uncontrollably. The door of the silver minivan opened and Quil sprinted across the parking lot. He pulled the screaming child out of Emily's arms and sat cross-legged on the dirty asphalt with her, rocking her, curling around her. Tears ran down his own cheeks. When Emily reached for Claire again, he shook his head hard and folded the girl into a world that was almost entirely Quil. The screaming continued. He whispered to her.

"You creepy pervert!" shouted Emily. "Don't you touch her!" She tried to reach into the circle of Quil's arms, but he spun on his seat to face away from her, rocking Claire and hugging her hard.

"I think it's okay," Bella whispered. "He's okay."

Claire screamed and kicked.

"He knows what it's like," whispered Bella, remembering what Jacob said about the layers of Quil's mind. When Emily clawed for him again, Leah dropped the bottle and pulled her away. As the baby squalled, Bella picked up the bottle, which had fallen on the floor mat next to a cat carrier. Specks of dirt and lint clung to the orange rubbery nipple, so she wiped it on her shirt before sticking it back in his mouth. Leah was telling her cousin about Quil's dad. Bella stared at the baby, his black eyes and pink, sweaty face, and wondered if she should have washed the nipple.

Emily didn't give a fuck about what had happened to Quil's dad. Bella cringed to hear her say it—shout it—to Leah as she flung off her cousin's arms and started for Claire again. Quil got up and jogged around the parking lot with the girl, bouncing her. She wrapped her arms around his neck and her legs around his waist. "Shh!" he said as she screamed over his shoulder. "Shh! It's okay. It's okay."

It was not okay.

Jeremy spat out the bottle to cry, too.

 _No wonder Julie is freaking out,_ thought Bella, trying to make him suck on the bottle again. She found the pacifier, also linty and dirty on the floor mat, and wondered if the baby could get sick from it. She wiped it off, but he refused it. His raspy, bleating cries made her think she should pick him up, but she couldn't unfasten the car seat buckles.

"Here, take this," said Angela. Bella had almost forgotten about her. Angela passed her a red cord, freed the baby, and held him against her shoulder, patting his back firmly. _Smack, smack, smack._

Should a person pat a baby this hard? Bella wondered. Jeremy's little head flopped against Angela's neck. He opened his toothless mouth and gummed onto her neck, sucking hard. "Ow, ow, ow!" she said, still smacking his back. "Jesus!" Then she looked at the sky and said, "Sorry, God." The baby made an enormous burp and vomited formula down the back of her shirt.

Somehow, it deflated the situation. Claire leaned her head on Quil's shoulder, sniffling now instead of screaming. Leah looked at the barfy back of Angela's shirt with a curled lip and found Claire's zebra in the box of baby stuff. She used the toy as a rag while Claire wasn't looking. Emily screwed the heels of her hands in her eyes and said, "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry, Quil. I was upset."

"Fine," frowned Quil. "I wouldn't want a creepy pervert to get at her, either."

Bella looked at the red cord in her hand and realized it was a leash. At Angela's feet sat an old, white-muzzled Basset hound with droopy red eyes, long brown ears, and a slobbery chin.

"Isn't he cute?" said Angela. The dog leaned on her leg. "He loves me already."

Now, as they rode in Sam's truck, Claire slept in her carseat, exhausted and dehydrated. Leah grimly ferried them home and Bella stared at the yellow dashed lines. Emily found a tissue in her purse and blew her nose quietly. At least, thought Bella, Angela was having a good day. Once they'd loaded the kids in the truck, they realized there was no room for one more adult and a dog. Quil offered Angela a ride. She accepted graciously. _Poise,_ thought Bella. Angela had conducted herself with totally non-crushy calm, walking beside him to the silver van, and the dog followed, sniffing his ankles.

"You guys are in some kind of club," said Leah as they drove. "Some kind of secret club, everybody except me, and it's pissing me off."

"Leah," said Emily.

"This is like what Jake said. Weeks ago. Everybody is following Sam around, doing whatever he says. Party at Sam's house, all the time. Even you."

Bella shrugged as if she didn't know what Leah was talking about.

"It's because of our break-up, isn't it?" said Leah. "Everybody's taking his side."

"No," said Emily.

"Not me," said Bella. "I don't even like him very much."

"And what the fuck is up with Quil?" Leah continued. "Acting all mature all of the sudden. Paying attention to a kid."

"He's not acting mature," said Bella defensively. After everything that had happened today, Bella was surprised—and worried—to hear Leah skip over Julie's problem and zero in on the pack. Leah was not stupid. "He's not mature," she said again. "He's his usual self."

"Of course," said Emily.

"He's not his usual self," said Leah scornfully. "He's all buff-looking, skipping school, hanging out with Sam whom he hates. Or used to hate."

Bella wished there were something outside the window other than trees that she might comment on to reroute this conversation.

"You can tell me, you know. That's what _friends_ do." It was just what Angela had said to Bella about her own secrets, except that Leah said it like a snake.

"I'm sor—" began Bella.

"Nothing to be sorry for because nothing is wrong," said Emily. "Nobody's having a club. This is not second grade. It's just— Maybe they forgive Sam. Maybe everybody has forgiven him except you."

Leah's eyes got very big and her face burned. Bella realized she was stuck in this truck, at least forty-five minutes from home, with an argument that had been a long time coming. "Holy cow!" said Bella. "Would you look at those trees?"

"Do _not_ ask me to forgive him," Leah spat. "I will never forgive him."

"Or me," said Emily quietly.

Leah glared at the road. "That's different," she said at last. "You're family."

"He doesn't forgive himself, you know. Like you. He will never forgive himself."

"Well, he dug his own hole! He can rot in it."

"You don't mean that."

"The fuck I do."

"Super green out there," said Bella.

"He's a good person," insisted Emily. "He feels like shit every day. Over you. Over me. Over my face. Over hurting Seth."

"Thanks for reminding me," said Leah. "One more reason."

"You think he can look himself in the mirror? Sometimes I think he ought to go ahead and cry about it, but he won't let himself. I swear, if I gave him a whip, he'd go out in the woods and whip himself like a monk."

"Birthday's coming up," said Leah. "Now I know what to get him."

Emily looked out the window. "He clawed my face," she said quietly.

"Metaphorically," said Bella.

Nobody said anything for miles and miles.

* * *

Quil is coming back, said Embry.

Jacob felt the voice in his own mind, but not in the others'. Sam was still half in Jared's head, learning to breathe like a tree. The Forks hunters were heading home for the day. Jacob had assumed primary responsibility for escorting them safely home.

You can tell them if you want to, said Embry. I don't care.

Sorry about before, said Jacob.

Embry shrugged.

You're very interesting, you know that?

Embry thought it was funny how Jacob added the phrase "you know that" to his statements when he addressed someone with a comment on his or her person. He had heard Charlie do that, too.

Charlie likes you, you know that? he said in imitation.

Good thing, said Jacob.

Riley's made up his mind. He's going to die tomorrow, on the last day of the search. Lots of volunteers in the woods. He'll wait till somebody sees him, and then…

Jacob caught an image of Riley's cold body half-submerged, tangled in a wash of logs and litter at the mouth of the gushing Sol Duc River. Volunteers on a trail would see him, scream, identify him from afar—That's him all right—Oh, God, poor guy—Oh, his poor parents—and then Riley would let loose, tumbling out to sea. He'd make sure his body was unrecoverable. He'd give his parents peace.

Jacob could see Riley on the beach through Embry's eyes, gathering the seals he'd drained. He opened their slack jaws and forced stones down their throats. Jacob could imagine their organs bursting as the vampire loaded them down, stone after stone after stone. It was like packing dufflebags. He supposed Riley would swim them out to sea and sink them.

Tell him I'm sorry, said Jacob.

I'm so tempted to hug him.

Don't. He could bite you.

He says we stink like dog shit. He needs a hug, and I should do it instead of Bella.

Jacob shuddered.

* * *

"What's that spot on your neck?" said Quil.

He was driving to Forks with a girl in his van. A girl he had laughed with at Bella's anti-Valentine's Day party. A girl who had asked her father to help him buy the van. A girl who had offered to ride an hour and a half with him, while his timing belt squealed, to Hoquiam to buy a new one. She had once invited him to have milkshakes with her, Bella, and Riley. Like a double date, he realized now. And what had he done? He'd turned around and invited Mike, and then at the diner he'd told her she'd never learn to flip non-dairy creamer cups like the boys.

This girl no longer seemed eager to talk to him.

There was a pink spot on her neck that he couldn't stop glancing at, even as he concentrated on driving carefully, obeying the speed limit, checking his mirrors often.

Angela sat with her hands folded smoothly in her lap.

There was a pink spot on her neck.

"That spot," he said again.

"Hmm?" The girl pulled down her sun visor and looked in the small mirror there. "It's a baby hickey."

"Oh." He wished he hadn't asked. He wished his face wasn't pink. He should have known that a girl like her—so pretty and sweet and smart and nice and friends with his other friends—would go ahead and let some other boy put a little hickey on her neck when he had been such an ass for weeks. He wondered what the other boy's neck looked like now. He wondered what her lips felt like. "Oh," was all he could think to say.

Angela stroked her hands lovingly over her new dog's head. They had tried to get the dog to ride in the back, but the thing only wanted to sit at her feet. She smiled at it softly, gazing into its big brown eyes.

The trees and fields passed by. After a while, he thought of something.

"What are you going to name him?"

"Sweetheart."

That gave him a strange feeling.

She only had eyes for the dog. "I think I'm going to call him Sweetheart."

God, he was an idiot.

* * *

Leah pulled into Bella's driveway to drop her off. Claire and her brother were still asleep. The three women climbed out of the truck so they could talk without waking them.

"He clawed your face," said Leah flatly.

"Not really. He spooked the bear. The bear clawed me."

"He caused the bear to claw your face."

"Yes."

"You are such a liar."

Emily blew her nose and said, "Doesn't matter what you think. Julie's afraid of the baby." It was hard for her to explain this in a way that made sense because it didn't make sense. "Julie is afraid of the baby. He can't even roll over, and she thinks he's trying to get her."

"That's insane," said Leah.

"Possibly," said Emily, and she began to cry again. "I'm losing her. Something is happening to her." She said Julie sometimes called her in the middle of the night, pacing around her house and trying to hide from the baby. Emily could hear him crying in the background. Taking Claire for a week when Jeremy was born had turned into two weeks, then a month, then two months….. and it didn't look like Claire could go home any time soon. Jeremy Vasquez, Sr., was in Afghanistan with the Navy. "What the fuck is the Navy doing in a desert?!" Julie screamed one night. "The DoD is lying to me!" It was hard for Emily to talk her down. It was true that Jeremy couldn't always tell his wife where they were going, but Emily figured he was indeed in Afghanistan. He was a Navy SEAL. They did plenty of things on land. But maybe Julie would rather imagine that he was in the Gulf of Oman. She had suggested this. But Julie had screamed that _someone_ was lying to her if that were true.

Their mother was equally concerned. She worked full time cleaning vacation cabins. She couldn't take the baby, but _somebody_ had to take the baby because often, when she went to check on Julie, Julie was hiding from the baby. Her heart, too, was breaking for her daughter.

Emily stared at the driveway, exhausted. "I can't take care of Claire _and_ the baby. I said I could, but I just can't."

"It's spring break next week," Bella offered. "I could help. I guess. I mean, I don't know how, but I could hold it or something."

"It's not an 'it.' _He's_ not an 'it.'"

Leah offered to help, too. "It's my cousin."

"I had a class in junior high," said Bella. "I had to take care of an egg like it was a baby. I dropped it, but I could try not to drop this one."

Emily groaned at put her hands over her face. "It's a baby, not an educational project."

"It's not an 'it,'" Leah reminded her.

Bella suddenly remembered someone who needed an educational project. "I have an idea."

* * *

That night, as she made dinner for Charlie, Bella's thoughts drifted again to Jacob and the laundry room, despite Emily and Julie's crisis, Riley's aching heart, and Charlie's day with the hunters—despite these things that seemed more important. She felt deliciously warm, remembering how it felt to lie beneath Jacob as he pressed her into the pile of clothes. What was he thinking now?

She stirred rice and vegetables and set the table. Six o'clock turned into six thirty, then seven o'clock. Where was Charlie? She ate dinner, brushed her teeth, put away the leftovers, and had started on her homework, trying not to worry about him, when the doorbell rang. She knew it wasn't her father because he would have just walked in.

Jacob was on the porch. "Charlie's having dinner with Joy. Can I come in?"

She closed the door behind him and looked at the floor, biting her lip. She felt that her cheeks must be getting pinker and pinker, like a bowl filling up with water when the faucet has been left on. "Shoes," she whispered, pointing to a mat by the door. He slipped them off. A quick glance showed her that he was looking at the floor, too, his face just as flushed.

"Sorry about, yesterday. The uh, laundry," he said. "And then, um—"

"It's okay." She hooked her pinky finger through his.

"I didn't mean to scare you, or rush you, or make you think I only want one thing—"

"I would never think that."

"And I'll try not to do it again."

"Oh, no, no, no, no, no….." she said. She had to keep her head down because her cheeks were burning so much, but she managed to steer him backward until she had him pressed against the wall beside the door. She kissed his sternum because that was as high as she could reach. Slipping her fingers beneath his T-shirt, she timidly stroked his back, reaching no more than a few inches above his waist. His skin was burning hot and covered with goosebumps. "Is this okay?"

She had to look up to see his reply, because he only nodded stiffly with his eyes squeezed shut and his hands balled to fists at his side. The light switch was beside his elbow. She flicked it off. "You can do it, too."

At first he shook his head.

"Please."

When he lifted her shirt just the tiniest bit, stroking his fingertips over the small of her back, she drew in a sharp breath. He froze.

"It's okay," she said, still touching his skin. "It's good."

"You're in charge," he whispered.

So she lifted her face and stood on her tiptoes, inviting him to kiss her, and she pressed herself slowly against the length of his body, firmer and closer, until she felt what she was hoping she'd find. He winced. "Don't worry," she assured him. "It's okay. It's good." His lips were trembling as he opened his mouth to her, accepting her tongue, responding carefully.

* * *

 _I hope you enjoyed the chapter. Share your thoughts with me, please?_

 _1\. What do you think of Angela and her pet? Maybe she should forget about Quil and/or Cody._

 _2\. What should Emily do about the crisis in Claire's family? How can Claire be helped? What about baby Jeremy?_

 _3\. Does Riley have a good plan to give his parents peace?_

 _4\. Your thoughts on the pack mind here? Is Embry's mind coming apart, moving in too many directions, as Sam fears? What is going on with Jared? Did you like the porch dog scene with Paul, or was that too icky?_

 _5\. Leah is not stupid. What, if anything, could (or should) she learn about the pack?_

 _6\. What do you think of Bella and Jacob's closeness in the laundry room? Are they unhealthily needy of one another? If so, is it okay, or are they headed for heartbreak? Will more intimate physical experiences be emotionally safe, given the intensity of their feelings? What if he imprints, as Bella fears?_

 _7\. Favorite bits? Stuff you'd like to see more of?_

 _Thanks for your thoughts, and thank you for reading. Oh_ _my gosh, it's been three months since I last posted a chapter. I hope you're still there!_

 _-AmandaForks_


	15. Chapter 15 The Legacy of the Last Pack

_Author's Note: Thank you to all the reviewers of Chapter 14, including several guest reviewers and blushings. I loved reading your notes, and I think you may notice that some of your suggestions have had an effect on this next chapter. Again, I must say, you all are like a team I write with. Thank you so much for your responses. I hope you enjoy this new chapter._

* * *

 _ **Bella's Boyfriend**_

 **Chapter Fifteen**

 **"The Legacy of the Last Pack"**

* * *

"His name is Sweetheart," said Angela. Softly, she stroked the dog's face and long brown ears as he sat at her feet in the Webers' living room. Bella petted him, too, but he only had eyes for Angela. It seemed he knew he would never go back to that shelter, and it was because of this tall, slim girl with long brown hair. He lay his head in her lap and gave a snuffly, doggy sigh.

It was Sunday evening. By this time last night, Bella had visited two animal shelters, adopted three cats for Claire, sat captive in Sam's truck while Emily and Leah argued about Sam and forgiveness (not a chance, said Leah), and withstood another argument in her driveway about Sam's clawing Emily's face. "Metaphorically," Bella had added. But Leah was not fooled because Leah was not stupid. Something strange was going on in La Push, and Bella figured it was only a matter of time before Leah figured it out. She hoped it wouldn't happen in the same way she had hoped Jake would never find out about vampires. Why should her friend be dragged into this world of monsters and magic? There wasn't anything Leah could do about it, so it would be best for her to never know.

Also by this time last night, Bella had seen Emily's sister break down in a dirty parking lot and give up her baby, albeit temporarily. Poor Julie. Poor Emily. Poor Claire! And poor Quil. She wondered if the imprint that compelled him to comfort Claire could offer him anything in return. A feeling of purposefulness? Maybe a feeling of peace for helping? He was a mess. She also wondered if Sam had helplessly dogged Emily when he'd first imprinted. Was that love? It looked like panic and nausea, at least for Quil.

Then there was the baby. Jeremy. How was Emily going to handle a baby in addition to everything else? Bella hoped their plan to foist the baby off on someone else would work. There was a certain person they had in mind…

Tomorrow, Monday, March 16, was the first day of spring break. She planned to spend it catching up on sleep and making out with Jacob. Maybe both. Maybe they could snag a secret, snuggly nap together while Charlie was at work. And Angela, she could tell, would be spending it with her new Sweetheart.

Bella had been invited to the Webers' house for dinner after her Sunday shift at Newton's Outfitters. So now, after a dull day of work, she sat in the presence of wonderment as Angela and the Basset hound gazed lovingly at one another. Mrs. Weber sat near the fireplace, working on a needlepoint embroidery of birds, blue flowers, and what Bella figured was a verse from the Bible: "His eye is on the sparrow." She had a large wooden frame to stretch the cloth. Reverend Weber frowned at a crossword puzzle in the _Times,_ and Angela's eight year old twin brothers looked critically at Sweetheart.

"He's awful old," said Lucas. "Why get a pet that's gonna die soon?"

"Shh," said Mrs. Weber.

"So he won't die alone," said Angela, without taking her eyes from the dog.

Reverend Weber said, "You did the right thing." He tucked his newspaper in the cushions of his chair, Mrs. Weber tied a knot in her blue silk thread, and the two of them went into the kitchen to work on dinner.

As soon as they were gone, Lucas and Joshua tried to grab Sweetheart's tail, but he just swished it here and there, avoiding their little hands. "He's stinky, too," they said. "He smells like a fart. An old fart farty old dog." They sniggered with their heads on each other's shoulders.

"We don't talk like that in our family," came Mrs. Weber's voice from the kitchen.

"Let's go to my room," said Angela. Awkwardly, she got her arms around the dog, one under his chest and the other supporting his hind legs. He was a medium-sized dog, small enough to be carried but big enough to be heavy. Angela leaned on the wall as she climbed the stairs, explaining that stairs weren't good for Bassets, with their long spines and short legs, especially one this old.

"Geez," said Bella. "How old is he?"

"I don't know. The shelter didn't know. I'm taking him to the vet tomorrow."

In her room, Angela set Sweetheart on the floor. He sniffed around the baseboards as the girls talked, his long brown ears sweeping the carpet. The rest of his body was white with brown spots and brown freckles on his forefeet.

"I think I'll take him to see Albertine," said Angela, "if the place allows pets indoors. She'd probably like him."

"Mike, too," said Bella. "I'm sure he'd like him. Everyone will like him."

"Yeah, maybe Mike, too. I kind of want to show him off, but I also kind of want to keep him to myself."

Bella nodded. Sweetheart finished inspecting the room and came to lie between the girls on the carpet. She petted him more. He was very soft, though admittedly a little stinky, and she found herself relaxing, smiling before she realized it in the presence of this warm, trusting animal.

"I took him to church this morning," said Angela. "But my dad made me leave him outside. I tied his leash to the front railing, and he sniffed all the people going inside, and a lot of people petted him. He's so gentle. Even with little kids being noisy and excited around him. I told my dad he was perfect."

Bella sensed there was a "however" to this story.

"So I left him outside," said Angela, "but in the middle of the homily, we all heard this noise. Kind of low and moaning."

"It was him?"

"Howling and howling. Like, 'Arrr, arrr, arrr-oooooo, orrt-orrt-oooooooo,'"

At her imitation, Sweetheart lifted his chin and made mumbly, doggy talking sounds.

"I love him so much already," said Angela. "My mom was right."

"I'm glad," said Bella. "I was going to ask you how it went with Quil, riding in the van yesterday."

She shrugged. "He was very quiet."

 _Probably thinking about Claire,_ Bella thought.

"I do not even care," said Angela. "Cody, too. Whatever."

"So we can go ahead and lose the bowling tournament now?"

"Sure." She laughed. At the sound, Sweetheart struggled to his feet, more alert, and said, "Wuff," in his deep, worn voice. "Oo is a sweetie dog," said Angela, kissing his forehead. "Yes, oo is. Oo is my widdle sweetie dog." He licked her face.

 _Gross,_ thought Bella.

"Oo is all sloppy," said Angela. "Bleh."

* * *

Driving home, Bella hoped Jacob would be waiting for her. He'd come over last night, pink-cheeked, feeling awkward about, um, _certain things_ that made her blush, too, and she'd walked him backward till his heels hit the wall beside her front door and gently let him know that these _certain things_ were okay. More than okay. He'd been so nervous about it. It made her love him more. It made her want to treat him as tenderly as he treated her: a little hesitant, a little eager, a little bit burning with uncertainty and need. It felt so good to say that they needed each other. They ended up on the couch, confessing their longing, making promises…. and totally _ruining_ each other's skin, finding new places to leave marks with kisses and nibbles.

She was on top. She found a place to kiss behind his ear. Then she stretched the neck of his shirt to let her kiss his collarbone, neck, and shoulders the way he'd done to her so many times. Oh, he _really_ liked that, and she told him to not touch her while she did it. It made her feel absolutely wicked to hear his little squeaky sounds as he held his hands beneath the small of his back, trying to be good. She kissed his breastbone through his shirt and kissed down from his ribs until she reached the hem. "Let me touch you," he said. "No," she said, but it sounded like "Nerr," because she had the bottom of his shirt in her teeth as she moved it to expose an inch or so of his warm, brown skin. She stroked that little strip of bare stomach with her nose, whispering, "Is this okay?" and he nodded, watching her as she kissed here and there.

"You are mine," she had whispered, "and I'm going to put a mark on you."

"Yes, bite," he said, which surprised both of them. "Is that weird?" he worried. Sor—"

"No." She gave him a little pinch with her teeth. He shivered. She made a pink spot with her next kiss, nibbling and sucking, and then she made several more, thinking, _mine, mine, mine, mine._ "Nobody else."

He knew what she meant. "I won't. I just won't. Or I'll fight it."

"How about you just not do it?"

"How about you just not think about it when we're… you know? I won't think about this when I'm phased, and you please not think about _that_ when we're together."

 _That._ The I-word. She looked up at him, unaware that her brown eyes were so warm and glowing, so full of love and worry that he vowed right then that _nothing_ would keep him from her. He let his head roll back, hoping she'd kiss his neck again, but instead he felt her mouth on his belly, her whole mouth, wide and soft and—

 _Thbbbbbbt!_

She blew fat raspberries until he flipped her and hovered over her, kissing her face. "Not romantic. Thbbt. What's that?" When she stuck out her tongue and made the noise again he caught it in his mouth, kissing her deeply, letting his body settle over hers until _certain things_ were obvious. "It's okay?"

"Yes." She moved her legs so he could lie comfortably between them. It felt so good that she nearly broke apart from the delicious shivers that spread through her like ripples in a pond, and the center of those rings was the center of her body. She looked into his dark eyes as they relaxed, their bodies settling together, their nerves and worries fading as they held each other's gaze. It felt natural and easy, lying together like this. He put his forehead against hers.

Thank goodness the tall back of the couch was between them and the front door because that was when Charlie came home. Jacob tumbled off her into the coffee table with a crash, tipping it over, and Bella sat bolt upright, her hair snarled to twice its normal size.

"Aw, no!" said Charlie. "No! No! No!" He chased Jacob out the door like a bad dog. Bella righted the coffee table and went up to her room before Charlie could say anything else.

Now, as she parked beside the mailbox on Sunday night, she found not Jacob waiting on her porch, but Embry. Dressed in jeans and a plain black T-shirt, he looked filthy and exhausted. His shaggy brown hair hung in his eyes, and his bare feet showed dirt stains in his callouses. He looked at her wearily as she came up the front walk.

"Your face," she said softly, drawing a finger over her own cheek to indicate a smudge on his.

"My everything," he sighed. "Riley's gone."

"He ran away?" _Without saying goodbye,_ said a tiny voice in her heart.

"No, he's dead for real this time. Or more dead. And he's gone."

Evening birds were calling their last, sparrows settling into their nests in the redbud tree and under the eaves. Down the block, a parent hollered for her children to come in from the yard. The neighborhood was settling down to families coming home, getting ready for bed, and Bella stood there in her white Newton's Outfitters polo shirt, her keys dangling in her hand.

"I don't understand," she said, tears pricking her eyes.

"Don't cry. Please." He rubbed the heel of his hand on his forehead. "Jake's so fucking exhausted. Charlie's stuck in PA with the Sheriff there. The Coast Guard is mobilized. I'm supposed to tell you this and get you to La Push for a pack meeting tonight at nine o'clock."

"What do you mean he's _gone?_ "

"Can I come in, please? I'm so— Sorry to ask, but I'm so hungry."

She fumbled for her house key and led him to the kitchen, where he slumped into a chair and rubbed the heel of his hand on his forehead again while she searched the refrigerator. "What do you like? We got yogurt, peanut butter, some cheese— I got some leftover rice—"

"Anything."

She fixed him a meal that was far below her standards for presentation and flavor, sank into a chair opposite him, and stared until he'd eaten enough to think straight.

Riley was gone, he explained, somewhere in the Strait of Juan de Fuca. It was the body of water that separated the Olympic Peninsula from Vancouver Island in Canada, running east-west, connecting the Salish Sea to the open waters of the Pacific Ocean. It was nearly a hundred miles long and nine hundred feet deep, and Riley was somewhere in it.

Everything had gone according to plan. Almost. Bella tried to keep her tears back as Embry described the plan: Riley tangled in a log jam in the Sol Duc, searchers spotting him, identifying him—one even took a photo—and preparing to suit up and retrieve the body, but then Riley let go—it was very realistic, Embry said—and tumbled over the rapids, sinking, surfacing, letting his body roll in the current and bash into rocks, until he was washed through the river mouth into the Strait. Sam had been with the searchers and Charlie, wearing his black Forks PD shirt and looking surprised and saddened. Embry and Jake had patrolled the west bank while Jared and Quil took the east, prepared to defend the searchers in case Victoria or some other vampire appeared—or in case Riley snapped in the presence of so many food species. But Riley had satiated himself on seal blood yesterday and washed out to sea without incident. The problem was that he hadn't come back. They were supposed to rendezvous at Clallam Bay six hours ago.

"Jared's there now, still waiting."

"Something went wrong?"

That's what it looked like. It was supposed to be simple. A staged discovery. A closed case. But they hadn't planned on the Coast Guard or the fact that Port Angeles had police boats.

Bella had never heard of a police boat.

Well, said Embry, they're pretty cool, and under other circumstances he would have loved to check out a police boat. Maybe even go for a ride. Maybe Charlie could have arranged for him to meet the police boat cops and see the thing.

"You really like this boat."

Once upon a time, he sighed, he was a boy who liked boats and firetrucks. A police boat would have been cool. But this was not child's play. There was now a small fleet looking for Riley's body.

"Maybe that's why he hasn't come back."

"Probably. Now what?"

As he stared bleakly out the window, she thought that she didn't much like this plan. At least the search could be called off. And Riley's parents would have some answers. They were the _wrong_ answers, but probably the best possible outcome for the circumstances.

"Jake's thrashed," said Embry. "He sent me. I'm pretty sure he's asleep right now, but he didn't—" Embry closed his eyes for a moment "—he didn't make it to his bed. He's flat, at least."

"Poor Jake. Wait, how—"

"Forget it. My head hurts. Something's wrong with me."

"Jake used to say that," she said quietly. "Before the change. He could tell something was coming. Something was happening to him."

Embry put both elbows on the table, looking down, with his fingers ruffling his hair. His ears were pink. "I don't want anything else to happen to me."

She didn't know what to say. Riley was gone. She wished Charlie were home. She wished Angela weren't about to get her heart wounded, if not a bit broken, over the news that her friend had drowned and his body was lost. She had practically grown up with him, Bella knew; he was only three years older and had attended her church for years. Her father would probably be the one to arrange a memorial service and offer a eulogy. The town would be quieter, folks turned inward. Riley's parents would be— Oh, she couldn't imagine how terrible they'd feel. Tina, his step-sister who worked at the diner would be crushed and grieving. Even Mrs. Kranz would be affected. He had been one of her favorite students, following in her career-path footsteps. She wished she could help, but all she could do was bring Embry a dishtowel dampened with warm water. When he didn't take it, she dabbed at the mud on his cheek.

"Nothing's wrong with you," she said softly. "Move your hands."

He lay his hands in his lap and turned his face up to her. Gently, she washed the mud away as he insisted that yes, something was wrong with him. His head felt like a highway, so many awarenesses passing through him. Usually Jake. Often Quil. Once or twice, Jared. Three times, Paul. At first, it only happened while a wolf, but lately, the presences were more intrusive, coming to him when he was human, or when the others were human. Even once while he was sleeping. It had been early morning, Paul was supposed to be sleeping on his mother's sofa, and he'd sat bolt upright in bed suddenly knowing that Paul was gone. A glance out the window showed the wounded boy streaking through the backyard.

Bella cleaned his cheek, rinsed the cloth, and stroked it over the rest of his face. His forehead. His chin and neck. His straight, narrow nose and dark, sharply-defined lips. He had one of those marks she'd read about in a fairy tale when she was very young; it was an indentation between his upper lip and his nose, right in the middle.

"You have a fairy mark." At his birth, she said, the fairies had put a finger there to keep him from telling their secrets.

His eyelids fluttered and his skin turned pinker. "I don't want to know any more secrets."

She cleaned the fairy mark and washed the rest of his face again because it seemed to relax him. Sometimes, with Jacob, it was best not to say anything. She hoped that was right for his brother.

"I can phase into air and back again."

"I saw you."

"Sometimes I'm afraid I'll get lost."

"Where do you go?"

"I don't know. I'm gone, somewhere, and I forget my name."

She frowned. Was that normal?

"Sam's right. I'm coming apart. I can literally be in two places at once, like in my house trying to sleep, and also part of me sneaking out like a— like a snake made of air, following Paul through the woods. Why _Paul_? He hates me. I feel like smoke. I feel like rain. I _am_ rain. Yesterday my mom called me, looking out the back door. I fell out of the sky."

"Oh, my god."

"I was dissolved! Something. I was forty thousand raindrops. I was nobody. Nothing." He opened his eyes to look up into hers. They were dark and wavering. Nakedly wanting. "What should I do?"

She could only stare.

"You're the Alpha Girl. What should I do?"

"The what?"

"You're the Answer Giver and the Secret Keeper. Like, please, what should I do?"

"You are confused," she told him, slowly, as if it would be hard for him to understand. "You need more sleep. I'm only the co-Alpha's girlfriend, and my decisions are usually shit."

"No," he insisted. "You're the Alpha Girl, even if you don't know it yet, so please turn into it _now_ and tell me what to do. Please, please, please, I'm going insane."

This was impossible. Turning into rain. Falling from the sky like Jack and the Beanstalk. Being an Alpha Girl. _The_ Alpha Girl. It began to rain, and she heard it pattering on the roof as if in answer, as if insisting that these things were true. Embry looked out the window at the rain that fell on the driveway, darkening the asphalt. Sunlight was almost gone, and a purple gloom came creeping out of the trees behind the house. A deep, deep unease sank through Bella's body as she stared into his face. There was magic, and then there was… What _was_ he? She felt her spirit backing away.

"I'm sorry!" he said. "I'm pushing you. Pushing you to change; I'm sorry; I'll go."

 _Like he did to Jake._ Bella remembered his guilt.

"No," she said quickly. "No, no, stay." She felt tears threatening again because he was still looking at her like she could help. Thinking hard, she said, "This is dangerous. Try not to do it anymore."

"I am!"

"You should tell Jake."

"No. No, don't tell anyone. They already think I'm— They don't have any energy to waste on me."

"Then try really, really hard!" she said. "Don't _dissolve,_ don't—"

A pair of headlights swung into the driveway. Charlie climbed out of the cruiser, his face blank of emotion. Bella knew that expression; it meant that a hundred awful things were going on in his scary cop mind.

"Don't tell him," said Embry. His eyes darted around the kitchen as if looking for a place to hide, and the air around him seemed to shimmer.

"Settle down!" She smacked his arm with the back of her hand and plopped into the chair beside him. There they sat like two children waiting outside the principal's office for an adult to come in and explain the rules. _Please,_ _somebody tell me what the rules are._

Charlie went upstairs without speaking.

"I'm sorry," said Embry again. "I should go. I don't know why—"

"I guess you gotta tell somebody," she mumbled.

He stood up. "You're right. I'm going to— I'm just not going to do those things any more. I think I can squish it. Like, mentally, you know."

She nodded, though she had no idea what the right response would be. _Answer Giver?_ No. Not her. Charlie came downstairs in full dress: his black formal uniform, gold badge, shined black leather shoes, and stiff brimmed hat. "Sit," he said to Embry, and like a puppy, he did. They waited silently while Charlie used the phone. "John," he said. "Yes. I'm afraid so. Yes. I'll pick you up."

Unfortunately, it was now Charlie's duty to knock on the Biers' doors (the divorce meant he'd have to do this twice), deliver the news, and help the family members through their initial shock. Reverend Weber would accompany him. Meanwhile, Charlie wanted Embry to postpone the pack meeting till ten o'clock. Embry closed his eyes and cocked his head, squinching up his face, and Bella said, "Stop! Geez! Just make a phone call." Frightened, he looked at her like she'd just saved him from falling off a cliff. If Charlie noticed that, he chose to ignore it. He told Embry to take a shower and borrow some of his clothes, and then he was gone.

Bella led Embry upstairs.

"You're a good listener," he said.

She shrugged, opening the linen closet and handing him a towel. In her father's room, she tiptoed to his dresser. Even with his permission, it felt like forbidden space. She cringed as she opened his dresser drawers, finding an old T-shirt and a pair of jeans. The jeans looked too small, so she looked for a pair of his loose flannel pajama pants instead. "Underwear, too?" she called.

He was already in the bathroom with his clothes off, running the water to warm it up. It forced her to holler, "Underwear?!" because she certainly couldn't go in there and ask him without shouting.

"Commando," he replied.

That sounded awful itchy. "I'll go make the phone call."

More and more, she was discovering the thousand little hardships the pack faced. A meeting at ten o'clock at night was one. She made the call and washed away the mud Embry had left on his chair. Then she wondered if maybe he'd like his clothes washed, too. She could get them while he was behind the shower curtain. First, though, she went out to the back porch and transferred some wet laundry to the dryer to make room for a new load. Then she climbed the stairs.

"Hey, Embry?" she said, knocking on the bathroom door. "You stay in there because I'm going to grab your dirty stuff, okay?"

With one hand shielding her eyes, she poked open the door and reached discreetly for his things. There they were, on the green bathmat, and there were Charlie's clean things, folded on the toilet seat, but the bathroom held an air of _wrongness_ that made the hair on the back of her neck stand up.

"Embry?"

The sound of the water was all she heard.

"Emb?"

Gingerly, she peeled back a corner of the curtain to check for his feet, and when she saw nothing on the floor of the tub, she yanked the curtain back. The tub was empty. Only steam in her face and water slipping down the drain.

* * *

Sam arranged his furniture into a circle in the living room: a large and small sofa, an arm chair, his great-grandmother's rocking chair, all the kitchen chairs, a desk chair, and even the plastic step stool Claire climbed on to brush her teeth. Kim could sit on that, he supposed. It still wasn't enough. He went out to the porch to bring in a couple of plastic lawn chairs. Crickets and spring peepers were chirping. Closing his eyes, he tried breathing like a tree, like Jared tried to teach him. He reached for the oxygen the trees offered, and at the same time, he felt a blunted pressure, like something wanted in. _No._ Immediately, it receded. My God, he swore, looking at the porch posts, if he could bang this out of his head, he would.

Inside, Emily was arranging cookies on a tray. She'd made shortbread flower-shaped things with a dollop of blackberry jam in the center. Last September, she'd picked wild blackberries for hours along the little-used road through the woods that led to his house, a hooded sweatshirt hiding her face. The sunlight hurt her fresh scars, she said. So did others' stares, but she didn't say that. Sam dragged in the porch chairs.

"Pretty?" said Emily.

He looked at the tray. The cookies were laid out in a fractal swirl, perfect radial symmetry. "Yes." He put his lips on her forehead, then her temple, then the lines where his claws had raked her self-confidence away. He wished he could wear them on his own skin.

"It's okay," she said.

That only made him feel worse because she knew when he felt guilty about it.

Sam's grandmother asked him to line up paper cups for hot chocolate. She was stirring a kettle of milk, taking care not to scald it. Hot milk—and chocolate—was Emily's plan to help everyone sleep better. His mother arranged carrot sticks and peanut butter on a tray, and when she wasn't looking Emily arranged them again, making a basket weave pattern. How does she do that, he wondered. Carrot don't bend. The carrot and cookie trays were set on the coffee table, and as people began to arrive, they were shuttled through the kitchen to be dosed with hot milk—and chocolate.

Bella Swan came looking rather green and teary-eyed. As usual, he thought. Bella herself was thinking, _Alpha Girl? Answer Giver and Secret Keeper? Shit, shit shit. Embry has gone down the drain._

Parents arrived in singles and couples—Joy—Tiffany—the Camerons—the Musselwhites—and the council members—Billy, Harry, and Old Quil—arrived in a group. Harry was more congenial than the others. Old Quil carried a large, blue cooler. It was the one they kept in his garden shed, the thing with Bella's vampire souvenirs. Did Emily know about this? She was still scratching out an agenda on her yellow legal pad. Kim, Quil, and Jake brought their backpacks full of homework, and Emily, without raising her head, told Bella to do the boys' algebra homework.

"I'm not so good at—" began Bella.

"I know," interrupted Emily. "That's why I want you to do it."

The boys handed over their assignments, not sure whether to be grateful or insulted. Bella frowned at Emily. "It's not even due for a week. Spring break."

"Well, goodie. You and I have a whole week to catch up on their homework."

Jared was still in the woods, waiting at Clallam Bay, and Paul was slumped against the hearth beside Ellen's chair, half-awake, his left arm still bound in the pale blue cashmere sweater sling they'd improvised at the Cullens' house on the night he was shot. Claire was upstairs sleeping, and in Sam and Emily's bedroom, in a plastic laundry basket pressed into service as a bassinet, a two month old baby boy lay awake, sucking on his pacifier.

"A baby?" Sam had said stupidly last night when Emily and Leah had arrived home. They came around dinner time with a large box of baby supplies, a sniffling, dazed toddler, two kittens, a cat, a litter box, and half a dozen other pet supplies. "A _baby_?" Sam had said, staring at the little person on Emily's shoulder.

"I'm afraid so," said Emily.

"What are we going to do with it?"

"It's not an 'it,'" said Leah. "And fuck you. You better take good care of my baby cousin."

"Put the baby stuff in our room, please," said Emily.

Sam made a sound like "Wha…?" and as Leah carried armloads to his bedroom, his mother, grandmother, and great-grandmother conferred with Emily on the origin of this pink, helpless, _adorable_ person she'd brought home. _Of course_ little Jeremy could stay with them. It was only right to help a mother in need. And they urged her to talk to her Aunt Sue about Julie's stress. As a nurse, Sue would know more about what to do.

"Might be postpartum depression," said Allison. "Poor girl."

"But she's not depressed," said Emily. "She's just worried about every tiny thing. Anxious. Panicky. And she thinks the baby is trying to get her." Here Emily began to cry, and Sam's family surrounded her with hugs, lifting the baby from her arms and passing him around. They shared stories of their own struggles as young mothers.

"Sam was a horrible baby," said Allison. "Never slept. Allergic to milk. Milk!"

"All the Uley boys were horrible babies," said Ellen. "My baby, your baby. Clara's baby Joshua. If it's a boy and a Uley, it's a horrible baby."

"That's why I only had one," said Allison.

"Amen," agreed Clara.

Sam sat on the third step of the staircase.

"Move it," said Leah, stomping downstairs and kicking him near his waist, on his back. When he winced, she said, "Kidney. I read a medical _TEXTBOOK_." She announced this aggressively, as if the accomplishment were a weapon. He scooted close to the railing as she came back with another load.

Allison was less excited about Claire's pets. "Where are we going to put the litter box?"

Leah hollered, "There's room in here next to Sam's side of the bed."

"No," said Sam. "No, we are _not_ putting a litter box in my bedroom."

"Awwww!" said everyone else, opening the box of kittens.

Leah kicked his other kidney as she passed.

"Jasmine," said Claire, giving one black and white kitten to Sam's mother. Its tiny mews irritated Sam's sensitive ears. Claire gave the other kitten to Sam's grandmother, saying, "Also Jasmine." Why are they both called Jasmine, asked the women. Claire replied, looking at the floor, that it was in case Bella kicked one of them.

"Honey, Bella is not going to kick them. And it was an accident," said Emily.

Claire looked unconvinced.

"Bella is your friend," said Leah sternly. "How many cats did she get you?"

"Three."

Ellen opened the second cat carrier. "Holy—," said Sam. "That thing is the size of a cocker spaniel." Claire said, "Chester," and Ellen said, "Oh, no, let's call him something tougher. Killer, maybe." As Claire lifted the enormous yellow cat, he glared at everyone with narrowed, green eyes and made a yowl that sounded like a cornered raccoon. Claire presented him to Ellen. He tried to bite her, but Ellen just laughed. "Killer," she said. "Or Nightmare."

"Let's call him Baby Boy Uley," said Clara, and everyone laughed.

"God damn it," said Sam. "We are not calling him that, and there will be no box of cat shit next to my bed."

"You watch your mouth," said the Uley women.

"Yeah," said Leah, tromping downstairs. "You're a bad fucking influence on my little cousins." Nobody reprimanded _her_ , and he just barely dodged her foot. "I put away all the baby stuff," said Leah. "Had to empty out a couple of Sam's drawers, but I put his clothes under the bed. Out of the way. And I set up the diaper station on top of his dresser."

"Thank you," said Emily.

Leah took her leave, Jeremy filled his diaper with a bubbly sound, and Claire wrapped her arms around the yellow cat's middle and hauled him across the room to show Sam. "He bite," she said proudly.

Sam had taken a long walk alone to cool off. When he returned, he moved the litter box to the bathroom. Then he changed a diaper for the first time in his life. It was complicated. Lots of moist, white wipes for Jeremy's little bottom. Baby shit stank. Emily leaned on his shoulder, helping. "Thank you," she whispered. "Thank you, honey, I know this is hard. And unexpected." She kissed his arm and shoulder as he fussed with the diaper's tiny, sticky tabs. Knowing he was helping her made him feel a little better. Jeremy was so small and thin. As Emily taught him how to support the baby's head, he lifted him gently and held him upright against his chest. "Thank you," she whispered again, her eyes brimming.

"It's okay," he mumbled. "Whatever you need." She stood on her tiptoes to kiss him, and the tight, cramped feeling in his chest eased a bit. Truly, whatever she needed was okay with him. Sometimes he felt like his entire existence was meant to help her, protect her, and love her. To be near her. To bear her burdens. And if he couldn't, he felt useless and small. Jeremy tipped his wobbly head back with a yawn and Sam felt his little body vibrate under his hand. "He's buzzing," said Sam. "Feels like, brrrrr, pop-pop-pop-pop-pop…." Emily let her head flop against his shoulder and laughed weakly, saying, "I think he's pooping again." The phone rang. Emily went downstairs to assure Julie that everything was fine, fine, fine.

Now, as the pack meeting began, Jared's father, Gary Cameron, said, "Hey, you got a cat. That's a big one, all right."

As if anyone had contested that. Sam stared balefully at the yellow cat lying at his feet. It looked like a furry watermelon with legs. He kept very still so it wouldn't bite his ankles.

"I call this meeting to order," said Emily. She perched on a kitchen stool, sitting higher than most of them, and took attendance. Charlie arrived in the middle of this task, still in his full dress, looking beaten down and blank. That left only Jared and Embry absent. "Item One," continued Emily. "The vampire is missing."

The parents were very upset. After Charlie filled them in on Riley's plan and the new search and recovery efforts of the Port Angeles police and the Coast Guard, the parents demanded to know _not_ why Riley hadn't met Jared at the rendezvous point, but why he planned on returning here in the first place.

"He doesn't have any friends," Bella pleaded. She was sitting on the floor beside the coffee table, working on Algebra problems. "Where can he go?"

"Away," said Kim's mother flatly. "He can just go away and never come back. Before he kills somebody."

"But he's a vegetarian," Bella pleaded. "Not a humanitarian."

Sam did not think he would ever understand the mind of Bella Swan.

Claire's kittens, the Jasmines, crept out from under the sofa where they'd been hiding all day and crawled onto Jacob's lap. He sat cross-legged beside Bella. "Awww," he said, scratching their tiny heads, listening to their tiny mews, letting their tiny claws poke him as they climbed over one another, purring. He nudged Bella, who shrugged and went back to the math problems.

Her mind just did not work like other people's, Sam thought. Kittens? Meh. Vampires? Ooh, yes. Aren't they wonderful? She was overly open-minded and almost fatally naive. Comatose, crumbly. But she had been recovering, worming her way into Emily's heart, into Quil's and Embry's. And Leah, he knew, had taken a fierce and unshakable liking to her after she beat up his truck. (Thankfully, the pack had been able to smooth the dents in an afternoon, though Paul's paint job was terrible because he'd forced Paul to paint with his tail as punishment for what he'd done at Jake's birthday party.) Bella Swan was unstable and unpredictable, but Jacob thought she was nearly perfect.

Sam had poked around in Jake's head more than once, looking for an imprint. His love was so intense, so forgiving, so patient. His love made Sam uncomfortable—not because he thought it was ill-founded, but because it reminded him that he didn't feel that way for Emily. He had felt that way for Leah.

 _They are different women,_ he reminded himself. _Of course I love them differently. Loved. Loved Leah._

This wasn't the first time he'd stumbled into present tense when thinking about Leah. Imprinting hadn't erased his feelings; it only expanded his heart to include her cousin. It was easy to love her. Was Emily not beautiful? Kind? Smart? Was she not capable? She'd been handling enormous responsibilities. He'd realized, when the secret was blown open at Billy's house a week ago, that she had been carrying the loads of three or four people without complaint, even while she worried about her sister. It made him love and admire Emily even more, ashamed of how focused he'd been on the pack, unaware of his imprint's suffering. He felt himself sinking into the bad place in his heart—the _unproductive_ part, he forced himself to call it—where his guilt fed itself like snake swallowing its tail.

Again he felt the blunt pressure at the edge of his mind— _NO_ —and he made himself focus on the meeting. Emily moderated comments from those who wanted never to see or hear about Riley again and others who argued for compassion and inclusiveness. Kim's parents were most strongly opposed to letting him return, supposing he did crawl out of the ocean.

"This is not a campfire circle," said Gordon Musselwhite. "We do _not_ have to make room for everybody. For a monster."

Jacob stroked his hand up and down Bella's back as she argued for clemency. His face looked so calm. Serene. Secure in himself and his purpose. Sam wished he could feel that way again. He'd felt it in class, at Evergreen, studying social work and substance abuse counseling. He'd felt strong, smart, and capable; he'd felt like the future would be _good._

 _This is my purpose now_ , he told himself. To love, support, and safeguard Emily and all people within his reach. But he couldn't help wishing that imprinting felt more like what was in Jake's head. Or what he'd used to feel in his own. _Different women. Different kinds of love._ If this wasn't quite okay, then all he had to do was to _make_ it okay.

"Sam?" Emily was looking at him with her purple colored pencil poised over her paper. She looked so sweet, so trusting, so hard-working, that his heart ached as the wretched snake slithered in its hideous, self-consuming circle. "Sam?" she said. "Your Order?"

"None," he replied succinctly. "Useless conjecture. If he comes back, we'll make a plan."

"Maybe we better make a plan just in case. Jacob?"

"Amnesty. Mercy." He looked calm and happy, sitting beside that girl who could neither color in the lines nor see her stray marks.

"Split, then," said Emily. "Advisory Alphas?"

"Burn," said Billy. He didn't even glance at his son.

"Escort him off the property," said Charlie. "Or out of Washington. Or America. Or Canada. Too close."

"Then he'd become somebody else's problem," said Gordon.

Ellen Uley, their oldest Alpha, also wanted to burn him, but first, she said, she'd like to dissect him.

Sam stared at his great-grandmother. Sometimes he thought that woman was more wolf than he was.

Jacob whispered to Quil that he should phase to connect with Jared and hopefully Embry, and Quil went out the kitchen door. While he was gone, the Betas weighed in (Emily and Old Quil voted for burning; Harry was uncertain) and Bella insisted that if the others could just meet Riley, could talk to him, they'd see….

Sam didn't care what Bella thought they might see. He stepped out to confer with Quil, now shivering as he redressed. Sam tossed him a dishtowel to wipe the sticky mucus from his face. Jared, said Quil, was still waiting for Riley, and Embry was unreachable. All he could tell was that Embry was experiencing some kind of distress.

 _He's always experiencing some kind of distress,_ thought Sam.

"But Jared's with him. Jared says he's got it."

Sam nodded curtly. _Why can't all of them be like Jared?_ As weird as he was, communing with trees, he never needed much and never flinched.

Back in the house, Jacob had moved to table the motion of making a plan in case of Riley's return. Nobody was getting anywhere with that, so Emily announced Item Two, spring break. This was their chance, she argued, for the boys to catch up on school work and sleep and for Kim and Bella to bake a lot of food and lay it by. Also, it was time for Kim and Jared to take on an educational project. Emily told Kim she would find the project upstairs in Sam's bedroom in a laundry basket.

Kim, bewildered, climbed the stairs while her parents, Gordon and Kathleen, exchanged nods with Emily. Sam was glad to see they'd discussed this.

"Mom?" came Kim's uncertain voice from the top of the stairs.

"Emily told us you'd been thinking of getting one of these," Mrs. Musselwhite said sternly.

"It's your lucky day," added her father.

Kim appeared at the top of the stairs, ashen-faced, holding the laundry basket. A short, slim girl, with her brown hair in two small braids and her berry pink raincoat tied around her waist, she seemed dwarfed by the size of the basket—and the educational project.

"He enjoys long walks on the beach and candle-lit bottle feedings at midnight," said her father.

"Ooh, I remember that," said her mother. "And two a.m., and four a.m., and six a.m…. Wasn't that fun, honey?"

"That's why we only had one," he replied.

Billy lifted his nose, frowning, assessing. "Where did it come from?"

"It's not an 'it,'" said Sam.

"Mom?" said Kim again.

Joy, catching on, began to laugh and laugh. She had to put the back of her hand against her nose to quiet her snickering.

Kim started down the stairs but tripped after only two steps. The regular people had time to scream even as Sam, Quil, and Jacob lunged for the stairs. They were too slow. From his slumped position beside the hearth, Paul had already partially phased, leaped, partially un-phased, and slid to the bottom of the stairs, knocking his head against the wooden steps as he fell. He landed on his back on the hardwood floor with his good arm cradling the baby against his chest. His left shoulder immediately began bleeding again, soaking through the cashmere sling that had once been Rosalie's sweater. Gritting his teeth, he rolled to his side, curling around the baby. Patches of gray fur ran down his spine, the rest of his nude body was sticky with blood and mucus, and his feet were elongated, tipped with curving, pale yellow claws. Jeremy made a raspy cry, and Paul, cringing as he moved his neck, curled tighter around him.

It was at this moment that the front door was kicked in.

* * *

Embry had not, as Bella feared, gone down the drain. He had simply sensed that Jared needed help and rushed away while Bella was in the laundry room. To spare himself the indignity of running wet and naked across her front lawn, he streaked around the house as a cloud of mist, ran wet and naked over the _back_ lawn as a boy, and tossed himself into the trees as water, the way someone might toss water out of a bucket. Re-materializing as a wolf, he coughed out some dirt he'd picked up in his few seconds as a puddle on the forest floor. The physical changes, which he had minutes ago resolved not to do anymore, just sort of _happened._ He was racing north, halfway to Clallam Bay, before he realized what he'd done. What he'd become and un-become in less than a minute.

Clallam Bay was a shallow crescent on the north shore of the Olympic Peninsula, west of Port Angeles. The tiny towns of Clallam Bay and Seiku framed it on the east and west ends, respectively. Between them, along State Route 112, more homes and vacation cottages than they'd realized dotted the shoreline. Jared, waiting just inside the trees, thought maybe this hadn't been a good choice for a meeting spot. However, it _was_ a good spot for a serendipitous, sickening find.

About an hour before the pack meeting, Jared smelled something stale and acridly sweet coming down the valley where Falls Creek flowed into the bay. It made his hackles stand up. Barely had he thought that he might need some back up when he felt Embry in his mind. He waited, one eye on the water, one eye on the woods, until the small silver wolf arrived.

It was easy to communicate with this wolf, thought the Beta. He didn't talk too much or ask for anything. Though highly verbal as a human, as a wolf he often communicated in pictures, visual metaphors, narrowing and widening lenses, a layered, translucent filter revealing priorities. It was easier to sink into instinct that way. The brown one flashed an image of ascending the valley with their feet in the stream, and the gray one returned an image of something leaping on them from above.

Of course. Not that. So the wolves had taken the higher bank, the west bank, and slipped into the cedars, prowling upstream. There were no trails here. Very little human presence. Wolf country. Ancient country.

Five or six miles upstream they found a campsite reeking with human blood. A light-weight tent lay littered with pine needles and clumps of lichen blown down by wind. Very little moonlight reached the forest floor here, so the wolves relied on scent as much as sight. They scented a campfire ring, its ashes wet six inches down, a sleeping bag sopping beside it. Already fungus was growing along one side. Blood as well as rainwater had soaked into the bag, and more blood had soaked into the soil. The scent was faint and degraded but everywhere. The wolves exchanged wordless offerings of support. Be calm. Be alert.

Two backpacks lay in the tent. Embry slipped into his old body to crawl inside. A man's clothes in one pack. A woman's in another. Gorgeous lingerie; Embry had to stop himself from fingering the lace, the satin and chiffon. It was exquisite. Utterly unlike the crappy cotton waterfall he'd seen spill out of Bella's dresser drawer in Jacob's memory. He tried to quash the thought; Jacob was mad that he'd accidentally revealed it and had asked Embry not to share it any further. This stuff in the tent was delicate, impractical, wicked, and wonderful, designed to be removed rather than worn. Sky blue and white, virginal except for the tiny clips here and there that would let it come apart all at once or little by little, depending on what somebody else's teeth were doing to those clips. He would have wanted to rub his face in it if it didn't stink so bad like vampire.

Quickly, he jammed his hand into the other backpack and felt for a wallet. Charlie might want to have this, but Embry didn't need to read the driver's license to know it belonged to Riley Biers.

He felt Jared's call and followed the wolf downhill to the stream. There they saw the deep eddy where Riley said Victoria had submerged him for three days. Maybe Bella could explain that. The bank was torn up, branches stripped, the earth and rocks scented with old blood. At the end, Riley had fought hard.

What now? thought Jared.

"Charlie," said Embry.

Sam and Jake, too, thought Jared. Now.

But they weren't phased.

Embry slid back into his wolf so he could reach farther, and the pain he felt from Paul's body was so immediate and intense that his footing slipped. Paul was caught in the middle again, bleeding, with Sue Clearwater pressing a towel to his stained blue cashmere sling. Through Paul's half-altered eyes, he saw Sam on a kitchen stool, his eyes shut, his posture defeated, pressing a bag of ice to his face. He was covered in red and black bruises and blood that ran from his nose and down his chest.

Jared squinted through Embry's eyes through Paul's eyes, and Embry felt his spirit deflate.

I hadn't thought it would happen like this, said the brown wolf.

Me neither.

We have to treat Sam like normal, said Jared. Not let him feel bad.

Sure, said Embry. Will he be the new Beta, then?

The brown wolf sat on his haunches. Huh. I guess. I'll step down.

They stared again at their crushed Alpha. It made Embry's heart hurt. He said, I just didn't think Jake had that in him. To tear him up so bad. In his own house. In front of the whole pack.

Maybe it had to be public, guessed Jared. To make it clear to everybody who's Alpha now.

Carefully, Embry reached a little farther to find Jacob. Congratulations? he offered.

His brother's connection was spotty. All he could get was confusion.

I guess we have one Alpha now, said Embry. That's good, right? Will Sam be your Beta?

That brought Jacob's mind into sharper focus. Embry explained what he saw and tried not to cower too much. The Alpha who did this was still his brother.

Me? returned Jacob. No. No, not at all. Nothing's changed.

But—

Leah did that to him.

Leah? How?

Well, she had boots. Steel toed ones and a lot of rage. Boots + rage = Sam's face. Ribs. Back. Gut. She didn't miss any spots. And she knows about the pack now.

Shit, thought Embry.

Embry relayed this to Jared, who stretched himself to connect to a human Jacob through Embry. Embry could feel his pleasure that it was working, even as Jared described what they'd found. The tawny wolf leaned on him the way sleepy friends might put their arms around each other's shoulders. You are wonderful, said the brown wolf. Amazing. There's so much in here. As if swimming underwater, the brown wolf's mind moved through Embry's.

It was invasive. He felt his thoughts crystallizing in self defense like frost on a window pane.

No, it's okay, said Jared. Or said the spirit that used to be Jared. Or the spirit that moved through Jared the way Jared moved through Embry. It's beautiful in here, said the spirit.

No, said Embry.

Yes. Blue earth. Your mother's people bringing in a whale. Heroes. Fed the Makah one winter. See their whaling canoes, lighter than those that travel far and full. Greenstone. Slate and granite. White lupine, white lilies.

Who are you?

You.

Fault lines rumbled beneath the Pacific as tectonic plates slid under and over one another. A great wave came. The spirit said, your father's people tied their sealing canoes to the tops of trees, and Embry saw them, hunched in their cedar bark capes. Children and mothers. Endless rain. Scooping the water out of the canoes with their small hands.

Come with me, said the spirit. Embry saw sea stacks, fog. A river mouth. Wide and and deep and gray. The river in flood. Trees thirty feet in circumference swept toward the sea, trees that could crush and kill, ancient giants. Heart pounding, he put up his hands to shield his face, went under, and lost himself in the river.

Someone called his name. A brother. Panic. He couldn't answer; he'd lost his mouth, lost his body, lost his _self,_ coming apart in a cold, bottomless, boundless white space. He was blind. Without form. Pieces of himself rushed away from one another, thinner and farther, smaller and smaller. He reached again for his brother and found Paul. Paul was still half-phased; his body burned with pain, but Embry was glad to put himself in this body, to hang on to any physical house for a spirit. Within Paul's body, a thousand tiny stingers of _something_ glinted like metal filings the color of late evening or early morning—a light barely there, lavender. They crackled in Paul's blood. But in his grasping, Embry pulled too hard; the river turned red; Sue Clearwater, bending over Paul and pressing a towel against his shoulder, cried out; Paul went pale, and for his sake Embry let go, slipping downstream.

Then he felt himself choking, clawing his way out of Falls Creek to lie nude and shivering on the east bank, a hundred yards downstream from Riley's campsite.

"Too far," said Jared, pulling him out of the creek. "You went too far." When he could walk, Jared urged him to cross the creek and climb the west bank. "I got a fire going."

Embry violently shook his head. "I'm not going back in there!"

Jared put an arm around his shoulder. A real shoulder, and a real arm. "The creek's not where you got lost, man."

A short time later, he was sitting by a small fire, still shivering, trying to keep his innards from revolting in both directions. Bella was right. He was just going to _not do_ those things anymore. Clearly, that would be safest. He hoped Paul's blood would clot without him in it. My god, had he nearly killed Paul? What had he seen in there?

"Jake said Charlie said we should burn everything." Jared circled the campsite carefully, finding a stray toothbrush, a stainless steel spoon. "Whatever won't burn we've got to bury." He made two piles beside the fire, putting the spoon, sleeping bag, tent, and tentpoles in one, and the backpacks and clothes in another. Blithely, he searched through the packs. In Riley's, a cellphone, its battery long dead. In Victoria's, _Sonnets from the Portuguese._

"What's this?"

"P-p-p-poems." Embry couldn't stop shivering.

Being an experienced woodsman, Riley had had matches in a waterproof container in his pack. That's how Jared had started the fire.

"I'm gonna fill this with the non-burnables," said Jared, opening the mouldering sleeping bag. "You drop those other things in the fire when you're ready."

 _My name is Embry Michael Call. My name is Embry Michael Call. My people are Makah. My home is La Push. My mother is Tiffany Marie Call. I am Makah. I am a man._

The fire was sensibly small. No need to attract attention, however unlikely that may be this deep in the woods. One at a time, chanting his mantra of identity, of solidity, Embry dropped Riley's things into the flames. A sock. He lay it across a log and watched the cotton fibers singe and glow, orange threads of flame creeping through the knit strands.

 _I am a human being. I am seventeen. My name is Embry Michael Call. My mother is Tiffany Marie Call. My father is—_

How hard would he have to work to keep himself together? To literally keep his physical self together? He tore Riley's T-shirts into strips. A week ago, even a day ago, he might have wept at this task. Poor Riley. Now he felt he ought to save his emotional energy.

 _My name is Embry Michael Call and my father has given me a gift I'd like to return. My father is a rapist._

Was he? His mother had said Billy hadn't _hurt_ her. Not bodily. But psychically, he'd left her confused and ashamed. She'd wanted him, in a way. That's what she said. She was scared, and he seemed like he could protect her. She felt drawn to Billy, sick without him. The feelings lasted for nine years. Nine years! She'd watch him with his wife and wonder _what happened?_ Her ex-boyfriend's name was Richard Dawkey—she'd finally given Embry his name since it didn't matter anymore—and Embry had looked him up online. He was convicted of selling methamphetamine and the armed robbery of several convenience stores in Port Angeles not long after Embry was born. He'd shot a clerk. She died. The murder conviction lengthened his sentence to life at Clallam Bay Corrections Center. _Just up the hill from where I am now._ But he hadn't completed his sentence. He hanged himself eight years ago.

Which father would he have preferred? _My father is a thief who beat my mother; he is a murderer. Or my father is a— an emotional rapist. A deceitful, selfish—_

A sharp whistle from Jared recalled him to his task. "You probably shouldn't go back there for a while," he said, and Embry didn't want to know anything more about where "there" was or how Jared was so comfortably connected with it.

 _My name is Embry Michael Call._ He would stick to the positive things. _My mother is Tiffany Marie Call. My brother is Jacob Ephraim Black._ At least he had a brother, he thought, dropping shreds of Riley's pants into the fire. _And my great-grandfather is Ephraim Elijah Black, Alpha of the Last Pack of La Push._ At least that was one ancestor on his Quileute side whom he could think about without disgust. Jacob had shown him a picture. Ephraim's eyes were black and ageless though his hair was white. He stood up straight.

When Jared had scoured the site to his satisfaction and filled the sleeping bag with what wouldn't burn, he sat beside Embry and fed the fire. "Look at this," he said, fingering the lingerie. "How much would this cost? Do you think vampires buy stuff or just steal it?"

"I don't know," said Embry. He struggled against the sinking feeling in his chest.

"Pay attention," said Jared. "You think maybe they can get into a store at night and take stuff?"

"What about alarms?"

"Maybe they know how to disconnect them."

"Maybe."

Jared dangled one exquisite white bra above the flames. "You think Kim would wear this if I asked?"

"God, no. That's disgusting."

"We could wash it."

"No."

"Ah, you're right," he sighed, reluctantly lowering the flimsy thing into the fire. It snapped and crackled with purple sparks. "Ooh," said Jared. "We get a fireworks show."

Embry waved the stinging purple smoke away from his nose as Jared dropped in a teensy pair of panties. They sparkled and crackled, too. Victoria's backpack, not so much. It looked fairly new. Her underwear, her shirts—the things that had been against her skin— made more smoke and sparks. Embry's head hurt; he had to move upwind.

"It's like the fabric absorbs nastiness," said Jared. "Or do you think they imbue it somehow?"

"Like Bella's windowsill, you mean?" All the wolves knew, from the others' memories, how strongly that wood had smelled. It _exploded_ when finally burned.

"Yeah. Does the stuff get nasty from touching them, or do they put venom in it somehow?"

"Maybe both?"

They dropped a long, silky stocking into the flames.

"You think Riley had some fun before he died?" Jared said.

"Should we hope yes or no?"

The stocking sizzled, purple sparks snapping skyward. Suddenly, they turned to one another with the same frightening realization. Jared got up and phased, dancing on his toes. He howled long and loud, but after a moment, dropped out. "I can't," said Jared. "I think they're all asleep. You have to."

Embry thought of tumbling into Clallam Bay as part of Falls Creek.

"I'll hold on to you," said Jared.

So they both phased and Jared put his teeth on the scruff of Embry's neck.

You really think that's going to work? wondered Embry.

You hang on, too, idiot! was the response.

Jacob? Sam? Embry searched for their signatures. Sam was impossible to get ahold of anyway, so he looked for Quil instead. As Jared suspected, everyone was asleep. He returned to Billy's red house.

Jacob! said Embry. Wake up!

Nothing.

Maybe I should just run back, said Jared. It would take half an hour maybe.

No. We might not have that much time left. Embry told Jared what he'd seen in the creek, in the blood. I think I can get to Jake, he said.

What if he's dreaming?

Is that worse?

Could be.

Embry took a deep breath as if preparing to dive into a pool.

Jacob's dream was shit. Easy to find among all the others' dreams because it was mostly Billy. Billy as an owl, a monstrous owl, always awake and unseen, prowling the night above them. Embry did not want to spend any time in this dream. There were trees and bio-luminescent mushrooms. Mud. Cold water. It was hard to run in the deep, cold, swampy mud.

Jacob, wake up. Jacob.

The owl had a sharp white beak. It turned to Embry with yellow, unblinking eyes.

Jacob!

Embry felt Jared's teeth pierce his skin.

Jacob!

The owl came swooping toward both boys, and Jacob sat up with a shout. Emb? he cried. Where are you?

Jacob, get that sling off Paul!

Embry? Emb!

The owl extended its claws, coming in for the kill on silent wings. Embry cried out, but it was only the brown wolf who tore Embry out of his skin and slung his body against a tree. His human body. A moment later, Jared phased back.

"He phased to go after you and tore up his room, but I explained. He's going to Sam's house."

* * *

Ellen had been awake when Jacob came pounding on the door after midnight. "Fire," said Jacob, and all Ellen had to do was flick a match into the fireplace, which she kept constantly prepared, full of wood chips sprinkled with kerosene. _FOOMPH!_ Paul lay on the floor on an old blanket so he wouldn't bleed on the furniture. Sue had tied his cashmere sling tighter around his would, packing his wound with cotton tape. It came out when Jacob ripped the sling off, like a string of stained intestines. It made Paul yelp. When Jacob flung the sling in the fireplace, it shot purple sparks in every direction. Some singed the carpet. One stung Jacob's hand. Paul gasped and writhed. "Burns!" he cried. But then it was over, the sling gone, the fire orange again, and Paul lay limp and quiet.

"Paul?" Jacob wiped the sweat from his forehead. His eyes were open and glassy. "Paul? Paul!" He shook him hard, and Paul drew in a long, shuddering breath and coughed.

"Hey…." said Jacob tenderly. "It's okay now."

Paul rolled to his side and slipped into a light sleep.

In the kitchen, Ellen opened a can of beef stock and heated it in a sauce pan. It smelled horrible, thought Jacob, like undercooked hamburger. Emily came floating downstairs in her nightgown and Jacob had to look away. God, she was beautiful, slim and graceful, her chest softly rising with her breaths. She wore a light green cotton gown with a demure white bow at the bottom of the V-neck. Her upper chest and left arm were streaked with scars, all the way to her hand where the last joint of her pinky finger was missing.

"Paul," she said, kneeling, waking him. She lifted his head onto her lap and spooned warm broth into his mouth. "Paul…" He couldn't speak. He gazed into her eyes until the broth was gone and Jacob said goodbye. Paul clutched his arm.

"You're welcome. But it was Embry and Jared who figured it out. And Emb woke me up."

Paul closed his eyes again, and Emily smoothed her scarred hand over his hair until he fell asleep.

* * *

Sam and Jacob called another pack meeting on Monday morning. Bella got the phone call at eight o'clock. So much for spring break, she thought. Sleeping in…. wearing pajamas all day…. Nope. By nine-thirty, she was back in Sam's living room. As an auxiliary, she had been asked to bring food. If she had know about this in advance, she'd have saved her money and baked muffins. As it was, she had to buy doughnuts. But they were gas station doughnuts, not bakery ones. That was her begrudging concession.

"Thanks for the shitty doughnuts," said Paul. "They smell like Valvoline." He chewed an apple fritter with his mouth open, smirking at her.

Attendance was incomplete. Most of the adults had regular jobs, so they were left with Billy, Old Quil, Clara, Ellen, and Jenny Cameron, who didn't have to teach until the afternoon. Quil was also absent, having been assigned to wait for Riley at Clallam Bay.

"We have a lot to cover, so let's move quickly," said Emily, ready with her purple pencil and yellow legal pad. "Item One, Embry is not in a sewer."

Bella hung her head. Last night, after the meeting broke up—violently—Bella had whispered to Jacob her fear that his brother was lost. Of course, every wolf heard that whisper and cracked up. Bella supposed they needed a laugh, and if her dignity could provide one, then so be it. But now they had to talk about why she waited two hours to say something when she thought a pack member was in trouble.

"He said I was the Secret Keeper," she said. _And the Answer Giver and the Alpha Girl. But why mention that?_

"There's secrets, and then there's secrets," said Sam. "Look. Dating a vampire? Bad secret. Another vampire lurking in the woods, killing hikers? Also a bad one. Embry in trouble? Jesus, Bella. If you think somebody needs help, you have to say something."

"Sorry."

He glared at her until she hung her head again. Paul snorted. "Tell us again what you saw when you opened the shower curtain."

"Well, I— The water was swirling down the drain, and he had just told me—" Here she looked at Embry, who was sitting cross-legged on the floor, eating gas station doughnuts without complaining. "He told me a secret, and he said I was the Secret Keeper."

"That's not always a good thing," Jacob whispered. He sat beside her on the overstuffed sofa, an arm around her shoulder, kissing and smelling her hair.

"This is not cute," said Sam. "Emb, tell us your secret."

"I think you better," added Jared.

Embry swallowed the last bites of his third jelly doughnut. "I'm, uh, having some problems."

"We know _that,_ " snapped Sam.

Embry flinched, and Jacob frowned at Sam. "Chill out. Why's he gonna tell us if you kick him?"

Sam folded his arms, closed his eyes, and took a deep breath.

"You tell," Embry mumbled, so Bella tried. His many forms of phasing were not news, but his momentary disappearances were. The others were frightened to hear how he had become rain, unwittingly, and fallen out of the sky when his mother called. He could follow somebody through the woods while staying at home. He could get into more minds than Jacob's, but only if unopposed, and sometimes this happened while he was sleeping.

Nobody said anything.

"Sometimes I like, flicker back and forth." Embry picked at a frayed spot on the knee of his jeans. "Last night I was solid, mist, solid, water, then wolf. In like, one or two minutes."

"It's like fire," said Jared, "except it's not." He described what happened at Riley's campsite and Falls Creek. "It's like fire you shouldn't play with. Or fire that eats your house."

"Talk plain," said Sam.

But Jared couldn't do that. "His eyes are open. The world pours through him. It's magnificent."

"It's shit," mumbled Embry.

"But he went too far. Nearly flowed into the bay."

"He what?"

"It's like we're all a part of something," said Jared, "except he's more _apart._ Get it?"

Paul snorted again, putting a hand in front of his mouth to prevent spraying doughnut, then licked his hand.

Sam said to Jacob, "Any time, man. Any time you want to take charge of this mess, it's yours."

"Gee, thanks."

"I don't want to phase anymore," said Embry quietly.

"It's not so bad," said Bella. "You just…" Was there some advice for this? Try harder? That's what she had said to him last night in her kitchen. Look how well that had worked.

"Elders?" said Jacob.

Old Quil said being down a wolf was bad for the pack except in Embry's case, where it would actually decrease their worries. The Alphas then could concentrate better. It could be, he said, that Embry wasn't meant for this, but that the presence of vampires had compelled some "extra wolves" to phase. Surely the stronger ones could handle it. Billy said that none of the records mentioned anything like this happening in the past. Maybe it _was_ best for Embry to sit out for a while. Maybe he was an "extra." That could explain why he was so much smaller than the others. Or maybe, said Billy, he was a quitter.

Bella saw Embry's jaw clench.

"You decide, boy," said Billy. "Are you smart to protect yourself, or are you a quitter because this is hard? Nobody said it would be easy."

Jacob said, "Nobody said anything; nobody told us this was going to happen." He looked as if he were waiting for a reply, but everyone knew there couldn't be any.

The room was silent. Jacob had pinned him, but Billy wouldn't look down or away, and the room filled up with the force of their wills. Bella offered them an out by reaching for a doughnut and toppling the box on purpose, but neither was willing to look away. "Oh, my carpet," sighed Clara. Still the Alphas stared.

"Stop it," said Ellen Uley. She waved her walking stick in the air between Jake and Billy as if she were knocking down spiderwebs. "Stop. Stop. Stupid." She beat the air into the carpet, slashing and thwacking. They yielded to _her,_ at least. "Man babies," she said. "Stupid pride. Blinds you. You're all blind."

Emily timidly tried to redirect the talk. "So Embry will….?"

"He could practice," said Jared. "I pulled him out of Jake's dream last night with my teeth."

That wasn't at all reassuring.

"I Order you to remain unphased," said Sam.

"Same," said Jacob.

"Thank you," sighed Embry.

Bella had the strangest feeling, as if something beautiful had died. "No. Just because he's bad at this doesn't mean he doesn't deserve a chance."

"He's not bad at it," said Jared.

"I'm out," said Embry. "Better for everyone."

"Well, okay," said Emily. "Okay? Then, Embry: shore leave. Item Two: Paul's wound."

Paul's wound was much better, healing for real. "Thanks to Embry going in the dream," said Jared, to which Embry said, "Consider that my grand finale. I'm retired." Paul looked at Embry without malice or disgust, which Embry decided was his way of expressing gratitude. He'd take that.

"Item Three: Jeremy."

"I move to let someone else take care of him," said Kim. She was sitting on the floor in front of the sofa with the baby on her lap. Her eyes were bleary and she was barely awake, but Jeremy was alert and busy. Busy at his age meant that he was flopped forward and gumming on her shoelace.

"Any takers?" said Emily. "No? Motion denied. Kim, don't let him chew on your shoe; that's dirty."

Jeremy hiccuped and spat white formula onto Kim's shoe.

"Item Four: Leah."

Paul's partial phase last night had knocked over Jared's father and a lamp. The bulb shattered on the floor. Gary Cameron was okay, just startled, but his surprise was nothing compared to the shock on Sue Clearwater's face as she stood in the doorway. The boy she'd doctored up a few nights ago was not exactly a boy. She hadn't seen this in-between stage before, and it looked— it looked— She didn't have a word for what it looked like. But Sue was practical. She knelt over the bleeding boy-thing and asked for a towel. And Sue was not a "kick in the door" kind of person. No, busting the shit out of stuff with her foot—an ex-boyfriend's truck….his kidneys….his front door—was someone else's signature move.

Nobody, not even Sam himself, tried to stop her when she kicked him in the crotch, drove an elbow into his neck when he bent double, and floored him with another kick to the side of his head. He fell heavily, clutching his ear, and she drove her boot heel into his kidneys and ribs again and again. Emily had looked down and away, teary-eyed, like she had no choice but to let this happen, and Bella saw Harry wipe his eye, too. No one had intervened. Maybe, thought Bella, everybody has a little bit of rage inside them, just like everybody is a little bit heartbroken. Or in Leah's case, a lot. Or maybe everybody was afraid. Leah's loose, long black hair swung over her shoulders, rippling with her kicks. She drove her heel into his eye, cracking his ulnar rim—that's what Sue called the place later—and broke his nose. Sam yelped and rolled when she got his face—the only sound he made—and Leah put her boot on his sternum.

He broke her heart. Maybe she'd break his, too, just crack everything at once, all those ribs splintering from his breastbone. Maybe he'd let her.

To Bella, though, Leah had paused because she needed an out. She got up and took her arm. Leah's eyes were almost unrecognizable, which scared her, but she stayed. At last Leah gave Sam a final kick in the abdomen and looked to Bella to put an exclamation point ending on the savage sentence she'd written on his body. Bella was wearing her tattered red Chucks. She gave Sam a symbolic, awkward kick in the leg and pretended to wrestle Leah to the front porch.

Her whole body seemed to shimmer. "He clawed her face," she whispered, her elbows on the railing, staring at the flowers beside the steps that she'd planted for him a year ago.

"It was an accident."

Leah looked at her hand, turning it over, making her fingers into the shape of claws.

"There's this thing," said Bella. "It's where you see someone and you just know—"

Leah didn't care what Sam saw or thought he felt. Inside, the baby cried. She lifted her heavy black hair from her neck, letting the night air cool her, descended the porch steps, and walked into the dark.

Now at the pack meeting on Monday morning, Emily said, "What are we going to do about Leah?"

"Nobody can do anything about Leah," Sam muttered. Both his eyes were still bruised, his broken nose healing crooked, his face scratched, his jaw swollen, and probably, he thought, wincing as he ran a hand over his side, two—no, three—of his ribs broken. They would heal faster than his heart.

"Good girl," said Ellen. "Nice and strong."

Indeed. Nobody else wanted to say that, though. A human girl had clobbered their Alpha. Love, thought Embry, is the most powerful thing in the world. In whatever way it shows itself.

"I don't think she'll talk," said Jacob. "Not even to Seth."

"Motion to do nothing?" Sam mumbled.

"Seconded," said Jacob.

"All in favor?" said Emily. "All opposed? Resolved. Do nothing. Item Five: Bella's stuff."

Apparently this had been on the agenda last night but was tabled when Leah kicked in the door. Old Quil wheeled in the blue plastic cooler that had been in his shed for weeks. The wolves wrinkled their noses even though Old Quil kept the lid on.

"Please don't open that," said Sam. "It'll stink up my house."

Old Quil opened it, making all the boys cough, their eyes watering.

"Ooh…." rasped Ellen, rising with a creak of her chair. She reached into the cooler and speared a photograph with her bowie knife. There was Edward, cheek to cheek with Bella, both of them smiling for the camera. "Oh, he looks just as foul as I remember."

"You saw them?" said Sam.

"Many times." She waved a hand in front of her nose as she looked through Bella's photo album, using her knife to turn the pages. "There's that Rosemary girl. Savage. But who's this?" She turned to Bella, an image of a tiny, black-haired, grinning creature dangling from her knife. She'd sliced through the forehead.

Bella felt as if a stone had dropped into her stomach, and instantly, her eyes filled with tears. "Alice…. My friend. Give it to me."

Ellen narrowed her eyes.

"Give it," Bella cried. "It's mine."

Instead, Ellen stabbed the entire album and held up the book like a limp, speared fish. Pages flopped open, the perfect white faces of the doctor and his wife flickering like a film clip for a moment. Bella lunged for it as Jacob held her back, and Sam said, "Out. All of it, out now."

The grass in the backyard was cool and still wet with dew. Bella woke up with her face on it; woozy, she lay on her side and tried to focus her eyes on the pack as they argued about what to do with her photos, her CD, and her plane tickets. What is it, they wanted to know. "Mine…" she tried to say, but she could barely make a sound. Jacob glanced over his shoulder. She closed her eyes again as they argued, Billy shouting from the porch where he sat in his wheelchair. Feet thumped on the wooden steps near her head. She opened her eyes again when she smelled smoke. The boys had made a little fire at the back of the yard. Sam knelt on the ground, blowing to make it grow, and Ellen squatted beside him. There was something she wanted. Pleasure, Bella gathered. Satisfaction. She wanted to be the one who dropped her stuff into the fire.

"No!" she cried, trying to sit up. Jacob took her shoulders, asking her to look at him. She tried, but his image was cloudy.

"What's it doing to her?" he called over his shoulder.

"Bella," said Emily. "Bella, what's special about that stuff? Did he give it to you?"

She heard a buffeting explosion and her vision went black. Moments later—or was it hours—she woke to Emily holding a glass of cold water to her lips as she sat on Sam's sofa again, leaning against Jacob's side.

Ellen had wanted to drop the things into the fire, but at the last moment, as she stood dangling the album over the flames, Paul had cried, "Wait!" He made everyone back away, as far as they could, as he tucked the tickets and CD into the album and tossed the thing from a distance of thirty yards or so. The explosion was far bigger than the one from the windowsill he'd tossed into the fire at Jacob's birthday party. Paul had remembered that, thank goodness. In the driveway, the alarm on Sam's truck was triggered. Sam, Jared, and Paul phased involuntary; Embry clenched every muscle in his body against the urge, thankful for the Order; and Jacob did the same because he was holding Bella.

"You are stupid old men!" said Ellen to Billy and Old Quil. At least, that's what the boys thought she was saying. Half of it was in the old language. "You had that in a box for a month. Singing to it, asking it questions." Her eyes were unusually large and dark; she stood up straight and her face hardened. Clara cringed; even the boys, exhausted now, dirty and sticky from running in mad circles, yowling around the fire pit, shrank back.

It was a beacon, Ellen said.

It was a beacon, or an anchor, or a poisoned arrow with the point in Bella's mind and the shaft still in the hand of the one who made it, no matter where he may be. Who knows if burning it had ended its purpose? Maybe it had activated it.

"I was not in favor of the treaty," growled Ellen. "We should have shredded them all. And we were _not_ outnumbered."

She cracked her walking stick against the hearth and tossed the halves into Sam's cold fireplace, now nothing but kindling.

* * *

"I don't understand," said Bella.

She and Jacob were speeding to Forks in the Rabbit. The day was gorgeous. Early afternoon, bright clear skies. Jacob had the window rolled halfway down to cool his skin.

"Nobody does." The steering column shook as he pushed the car toward eighty miles per hour. "Alignment," he muttered. "Like I got time for that."

According to Ellen, Jacob's great-grandfather had been a fool. She snarled this into his face. He'd have been offended if he weren't so baffled and scared. That woman had always been forceful, dominant. But now she was truly frightening. He'd never noticed how sharp her canines were. Had they always been that way? Ephraim Black was a fool, she said, and even Billy was too shocked to reply. Ellen had stalked out the front door, pulling her iron gray hair from its pins, letting her braids tumble down her back, and raking her fingers through the braids till her hair swung loose to her knees like a long, tattered cloak of silver—the color of clouds, of sea mist, of ash—as she strode down the driveway and turned not left toward town, but right toward the forest. Sam ran after her. Clara put a hand over her mouth and sat down, Emily hovering beside her. Embry splashed cold water on his face at the kitchen sink and went after Sam.

Soon Embry returned. "Are there any more of those things?" he panted. "Other gifts, stuff he wanted you to save?"

"No," said Bella.

"Think hard. Please." Now that they'd detonated the thing, ending its intoxication or triggering its call, they should destroy any additional keepsakes now instead of sending more signals—if indeed, that's what they were meant for—on another day.

"No." Her head felt clear now, though she was still scared. "There's nothing. They gave me some birthday presents, but I got rid of them all."

"Where are they now?"

"I don't know. Rotting in a landfill?"

Embry paced to the door and back, shaking his hands, rolling his head. "You want me to let you phase?" said Jacob, but he snarled, "No! No. I can handle it." Still, his skin seemed to shimmer. "It was like a bone," he said. "Like a bone he wanted to come back, dig up, and enjoy later."

"But I don't _want_ him to come back," cried Bella. With her head against Jacob's chest, she could feel a rumble that was almost a growl.

"I don't think he cares," said Jared.

"Try to remember," said Embry. "Anything. Other objects."

"I don't think so…."

"Think harder _,_ " snarled Billy, and at that Jacob did growl aloud. "Did they have relationships with other people? Other friendships? Other kids at your school?"

Everyone was looking at her. Billy. Old Quil. Paul, Jared, Jake, Embry, Emily. Sam's grandmother and Jared's mother, who wondered how long that stuff might have kept a hold on Bella if it hadn't been discovered and destroyed. "Forever? For the rest of your life?"

That's why Bella and Jacob were speeding toward Forks now. She had said, "Yes," as her eyes filled with tears. "Yes, I think it might have been the rest of my life."

"Tell me about her," said Jacob.

He meant Vera.

They flashed through a patch of shadows on the road, trees whizzing past, and then bright sunlight hit them again as they drove beside a meadow. Two deer stood near a roadside ditch, frozen, as if their stillness could hide them. _One for each of us,_ she thought. _Me and Vera._ She filled him in on Vera's story, her behavior, the clues Bella had been missing for weeks as she'd gotten to know her for the history project. "I didn't want to face it," she admitted.

Jacob took one hand off the wheel to place it on her shoulder.

At the nursing home, he careened into the parking lot and stopped the car with a squeal of tires. They took stock of their appearance. Bella looked presentable in jeans and a light sweater, but Jacob was wearing dirty cargo pants, a torn T-shirt, and no shoes.

"Shit. They're not going to let me in."

"Garden," said Bella.

She walked in the front door as casually as she could and greeted the secretary. "Everybody's in the atrium," smiled the woman. "Elementary school choir performance. Go on in! They're so cute."

"Sure," said Bella. "Thanks."

Of course, she was betting that everybody except Vera was in the atrium. The sweet sound of children's voices followed her down the hall as she darted into the empty dining room and opened a side door for Jacob to come in from the garden. The sound of singing became fainter as they hurried down another white tiled corridor. Days later, Bella would remember the joyful, innocent sound of the little boys and girls singing as a time when her life, even as complicated and painful as it had been since she'd come to Forks, was just a little bit better. A time when her life was not quite so awful as it became when they opened the door to Vera's room.

There was the old woman, alone, sitting up in bed, wrapped in her many mauve afghans with a pink knit cap over her tufty white hair. There were her crystal animals on the table, enshrined under their glass dome, preserved and protected, as treasured as Edward had intended them to be. And there was Jacob in the doorway, gasping, bracing his hands against the the doorframe just to remain standing.

Vera said, "Ephraim?"

She reached for him, years fading from her face, her thin lips trembling.

For a moment, he could neither move nor breathe. "No," he whispered. "No, no, no, no…" Bella put a hand on his arm and shouted his name—this tall, strong boy, her beloved, her best friend she'd grown up with, an Alpha, a chief, a warrior, a predator and champion who could slash, shred, or outlast any enemy, who could heal a shattered heart with tender patience—and when he didn't look at her, she knew she'd lost him. "No…." He sounded so broken and small. Or was that cracked, strangled "no" coming from her own throat?

"Ephraim."

Tears pouring down his cheeks, he knelt beside her bed and lay his face in her withered hands.

* * *

I hope you enjoyed the chapter. Thank you for reading. Help me out?

1\. Your thoughts on the "Old Ladies of Doom:" What should happen next for Ellen? For Vera? Did you see the doom(s) coming, plot-wise, or were you surprised?

2\. Beacons, anchors, or arrows: If the pack destroys the soul-sucking objects Edward left with Vera, what should happen next? Should their influence on the women's minds be destroyed, too? Should those things turn out to be beacons, calling Edward back to Forks? Egad, what then?

3\. Is Embry's foray into new and/or unknown territory (Jacob's dream, physical dissolution, openness to whatever goes on in Jared's head) dangerous? How has it been (or could it be) helpful? Does his decision to not phase anymore a mark him as a quitter? Or is he smart to protect himself? How might it affect the pack to have him sitting out? What would you LIKE him to do? (Besides take you for a picnic and gaze at you adoringly... ;-)

4\. How might Sam's family (the Uley women) and the way they treat him affect his personality and leadership style?

5\. What do you think of Embry's revelation—or prediction—that Bella is the Alpha Girl, Answer-Giver, and Secret-Keeper?

6\. What shall we do about Leah? What did you think of her reaction (and Sam's counter-reaction)?

7\. Favorite bits? Funny bits? Stuff you'd like to see more of or like to see happen?

Please let me know what you think about any or all of those topics! I am eager to hear from you and get ideas for the next chapters. Thank you all.

-AmandaForks


	16. Chapter 16 Moral Support

_**Feel free to skip this long Author's Note:** Thanks to all the awesome readers who reviewed Chapter 15: Ivy533, corkykellems, JSam1021, Samxxxx, Akala, silkyjacob, kini113, DarkSouthernBelle, Scoti, Blood-In-The-Stars, MelkiSihou, a Guest Reader, and serenity1006. I loved reading your juicy, detailed, thoughtful, inspiring comments! Some readers were horrified to see Jacob imprint on an old lady. Like, ew. But I know you guys trust me. I smiled at the things you thought were funny, like J  & B caught making out, and the baby buzzing while filling his diaper, and the pets: the kittens, cat, and dog. Freebird1202, thank you for sharing your family Basset stories. They must have been wonderful dogs. In my life, there were days when all I had was my cat to keep me going, so I know what you mean. I loved my cat so, so much and I know we feel the same about this._

 _It was also great to see readers' interest in what's in Embry's and Jared's heads. You gave me good ideas to work from about Embry's efficacy, his role in the pack, and the wisdom (?) of his not phasing. I'm so glad to know that readers sympathize with and like this character._

 _Also, I liked reading your reactions to the idea of Bella as the Alpha Girl. Mixed responses. Some said that Bella isn't ready. Others said she could mature into the role just as she has matured throughout my stories. And y_ _our insight into the way Sam's family treats him inspired me to make this a significant portion of the next chapter._

 _Lastly, I must say that I am grateful for your feedback about the scene where Leah kicks the crap out of Sam. Some said it's in keeping with her character; some said now it's time for Leah to step up and reclaim Sam's love; others said it's unhealthy and problematic that some fan fiction seems to glorify violence, as if beating up someone makes the beater admirable, fierce, powerful, and righteous. I have to admit (to my sincere chagrin) that I did not seriously think about how Leah's violence is basically assault. Thank you, LlamaMatilde and Ariel-Scrlett, especially. I am thankful to be educated, reminded of the fact that Native women are disproportionally affected by domestic abuse. If I flipped the genders in my scene, they said, it would be immediately apparent how wrong Leah was. And no other characters intervened. Wow. I was staggered. Thank you._

 _By the way, check out the Burke Museum of Seattle. On their website, they have an excellent exhibit called "Truth vs. Twilight," a collaboration of the museum and the Quileute Tribe._

* * *

 **Chapter Sixteen**

 **"Moral Support"**

Bella's heart pounded so hard she heard only the rush of her own blood. The world had slowed down, and she was standing as still as a pin on a map while continents and oceans whirled around her, agonizingly slowly. _Think, think!_ she told herself.

On the far other side of the Olympic Acres retirement home, the Forks Elementary choir was singing a song about spring. Their high, warbling voices drifted down the hall. Albertine was likely at the concert, and Vera was sitting up in bed, her feet hanging over the side, whispering soothing words to Jacob, who knelt and clutched her hands as tears spilled down his cheeks. The old woman's tiny, pale, wrinkled and bony hands disappeared inside Jacob's large, warm and brown ones. His hands were soft and strong, Bella knew. She wondered for a moment if she would ever hold those hands again, then forced the thought away.

 _Think, Bella!_

They had come to get Vera's crystal animals. Then _this_ happened. "I've been looking for you all my life!" wept Jacob, biting his lip to keep from sobbing. His bare feet were tucked beneath his hips, his torn pants muddy, his shirt equally filthy, his face pink and sweaty, and his black hair mussed and greasy. Vera smoothed her hand over his head, and Bella wanted to scream at her not to touch him because he was _hers,_ but she could only stand and stare, forgotten. Vera said, "Ephraim, let me look at you," but Jacob could not raise his head. He pressed his forehead to the mauve afghans heaped beside Vera's knees and then he did let himself sob, his shoulders shaking, his voice muffled by the blankets.

From down the hall came the sound of applause, long and loud, and Bella guessed the concert had ended. Jacob had said he would fight for her if he imprinted. It looked like she'd have to fight for him instead.

Hands trembling, her vision blurred with tears, she managed to shake Albertine's pillow from its pillowcase and lift the glass dome over the crystal animals. She could smell it now, the odor like old flowers in a sickroom. When she touched them, she felt weak and nauseous. Was this what she was supposed to do? Maybe she should put them back. They tingled in her hands, chilling her, colder and colder as she held open the sack. Tucking her hand inside her sweater sleeve, she swept it over the table, spilling all the figures into the pillowcase with an icy tinkling sound. Vera never looked up.

 _Now what? Think, Bella!_

Slipping behind the table, she unlocked the ladies' sliding glass door. Suddenly the pillowcase seemed to weight a hundred pounds; her wrist burned as she dragged it over the white linoleum and the lip of the doorframe. When she set it on the patio, just out of eyesight from the door, the concrete around it bloomed with frost. Bella dashed back inside and locked the door as a cloud of cold air flowed over the glass, creating more patterns of frost. They were the most intricately delicate flowers she'd ever seen, supernatural blossoms of love… _NO._

No, these were not blossoms of love. She forced herself to look away. The beige telephone on the table between the ladies' beds made a tiny _ching_ when she lifted the receiver, but still Vera did not look up.

The thing had a rotary dial. In the back of her mind, she thought that one day, she might laugh about this. But right now, she hated it passionately, jabbing her finger into the holes for each number and giving it a spin. And why did Sam's number have to have so many nines and eights in it? She felt chilly air brush the back of her neck.

"Hello, Uley residence," said Emily.

"I need Sam," she said. "Or Jared."

"They're not here."

"Quil?"

"Driving to work right now. Bella, are you—"

"He imprinted." She couldn't hold back her tears any more. "Oh, Emily. He imprinted. We went to get the stuff and he—"

Embry took the phone. "I heard. Gimme fifteen minutes. Maybe ten."

She asked him to bring Jacob a change of clothes and some shoes.

"It'll be okay."

"Liar," she whispered. The line went dead and she slid to the floor, leaning against the beside table and wrapping her elbows around her knees. She clenched all her muscles as if she could hold back this sickening and cruel twist of fate that gave one of Edward's exes Jacob's heart and the other Jacob's destiny. He had quieted himself, no longer sobbing but hiccuping and laughing. He sounded giddy. "You!" he said. "You were right here all along!"

"Ephraim, you haven't changed a bit," smiled Vera. As she leaned to brush the tears from his cheeks, Bella swallowed hard against a white hot ball of hatred that threaten to rise in her throat and choke her.

 _Stand UP, Bella,_ came Emily's words in her memory, and she forced herself to her feet, pulling a tissue from a box and wiping her face. Just then, Albertine returned, and her face lit up with pleasure at Bella's unexpected visit. Mr. Horowitz rolled into the room behind her.

"Well, who's this?" Albertine smiled. She was wearing green polyester slacks and a light spring sweater with a blue tissue paper flower pinned over her left breast. The children must have given them to the audience. Mr. Horowitz wore one as well, a yellow and orange thing that some kindergartener must have thought looked like a daffodil, and he wore it as grumpily as possible, smashing its layers with his palm as he stopped beside Vera and Albertine's bathroom door.

"He's my boyfr—" she began. Would she ever say that word again? "He's my friend."

"Ephraim," croaked Vera, her face aglow. "Al, remember?"

Mr. Horowitz frowned sharply. Still on his knees, Jacob amiably lifted his tear-streaked face. "You look familiar…." said the old man suspiciously.

"I never thought I'd see him again," said Vera. She kept her hand on Jacob's shoulder.

"Nor did I," said Albertine uncomfortably. "Bella, what is this? _Who_ is this?"

"My friend."

"He found me," said Vera. "There he is."

Bella had never heard her string so many words together in all the time she'd known her as she'd heard in the last fifteen minutes. Or had it been hours? She blinked back more tears as Albertine and Mr. Horowitz conferred in mutters. Surely Jacob could hear whatever they were saying, but he didn't react. Instead he put his right hand over Vera's on his shoulder and wiped the back of his left hand across his nose.

"Use a tissue, young man," said Albertine.

The tissues were on the bedside table behind Bella, too far for him to reach. Instead, he lifted his shirt as if to wipe his nose with it, and Bella begrudgingly passed him a tissue, thinking, _Look at me. Touch me._ Their fingers brushed, but Jacob didn't react to that, either. Vera bent over her knees in a coughing fit, and _that_ made him stand up, smoothing his hand over her back until she stopped and cleared her throat. Wondrously, he stroked his finger over the back of her hand, watching how the blue veins shifted beneath her papery skin and over her wiry, raised tendons. With his thumb, he stroked her ridged fingernails.

"That's enough, young man," said Albertine. Jacob knelt again, still holding Vera's hand. "What is the meaning of this? Who are you?"

He couldn't seem to speak. Vera answered for him. "Ephraim."

"That's impossible," said Mr. Horowitz. "He's too young. Doesn't look quite the same. Acts like a moon-eyed cow. And it's been _seventy years,_ woman."

"It's magic," rasped Vera, her eyes widening. "You never believed."

" _I_ believed, _"_ snarled Mr. Horowitz. "I believed all this was a bad idea, and we don't need any jokes about it. You, boy, speak up."

Jacob just closed his eyes and leaned his head against Vera's mauve afghans.

Bella sank onto Albertine's bed, her elbows on her knees and her face in her hands. Ephraim, she realized, was the "big Indian" from Mr. Horowitz's story, the Indian who had followed Vera and Edgar Culpepper, the Indian who wasn't there to prevent Bertram's death in the logging camp, and who was instead found at the murder scene of Hoquiam High's handsy vice principal, the creep who'd made a pass at Rosemary, grabbing her in the hall. She had dislocated his elbow. Bella suddenly realized that Rosemary—or Rosalie—must have killed him. Not Edward or Edgar. Not Ephraim, though he spent several days in jail while the police tried to pin it on him. What had he been to Vera? He was a generation ahead of her, married, possibly a father by then and supposedly busy as Chief, more than a hundred miles north in La Push. Tears trickled through her fingers. "This is horrible," she blurted. "Horrible!"

"Yes, it is," growled Mr. Horowitz. "And you, girlie, are more involved than I thought. You like trouble, don't you?"

Jacob looked at the ceiling. Bella thought she heard a scuffling sound on the roof. When a shadow dropped onto the patio behind the ladies' thin curtain, she looked away. Albertine had backed against the wall beside her knitting basket. "Get out," she whispered.

"No." Bella could hardly believe she was saying this. "Don't make him go; it'll kill him."

"Magic," said Vera again.

"Magic, my ass," said Mr. Horowitz.

"He's Ephraim's great-grandson," Bella explained. "He's my b— my friend, and I told him about her." She almost wiped her nose on her shirt like Jacob but thought better of it. The shadow outside the door was gone, and the cold feeling was gone, too. She could think clearly. So many lies had been told—for seventy years—that she didn't have the heart for any more. She sucked a lying anyway, so her story was mostly true. "I told him about Vera, and he wanted to meet her." That part was true. "He always wanted a grandma." That part she _hoped_ was true.

Mr. Horowitz wasn't convinced. "Then why are you both crying?" he demanded.

 _Magic,_ Bella almost said. _It's because of the world's crappiest magic._

Mr. Horowitz also wanted to know why he didn't speak. "Is he simple-minded?"

"Ephraim talks fine," said Vera.

"Woman! This giant, mute baby is not Ephraim. Your mind is working against you. Again."

"His name is Jacob," Bella sighed. "Jacob Ephraim Black."

"Like I told you," said Vera and Mr. Horowitz at once.

"A great-grandson?" said Albertine.

"I have one and you don't," said Vera.

A backpack flopped onto the patio: Jacob's clothes, she assumed. When she stepped out and took them from the pack, Embry whispered from the roof, "Throw it back to me." It took a few tries for her to toss it up there. "For fuck's sake, can't you throw ten feet?" he hissed. "You should have just tossed down the clothes," she said. She had to put one of Jake's shoes back in it to give it enough weight to throw it well, and Embry took out the shoe and dropped it on the little heap of clothes beside her. "Hey," he said. "It's going to be okay." He dropped the pillowcase with Vera's animals into the pack. "I'm right here for you."

She started to wipe her nose on her sleeve.

"Shirt off my back," he said gallantly, whipping it off and offering it to her as a tissue. She assumed he did it to make her laugh. She merely looked at him bleakly before blowing her nose on his shirt. She was quite stuffy and had to use several spots. "Wow," he said. "I didn't think you'd actually do that." He lay down on his stomach, grimacing as his skin touched the cold, gritty shingles, and said, "I'll wait for you."

"You want your shirt back?"

"Gimme Jake's dirty one."

Inside, she offered Jacob his fresh clothes. He looked at them like he didn't know what they were for, so she prodded him to the bathroom. It felt like taking care of a toddler; she had to bite her lip against more tears as he changed behind a partition, handing her his dirty things.

"Should you be in there alone with a boy?" called Albertine.

"Nothing is going to happen," she said.

But then something did happen. From behind the partition, she heard the sound of Jacob being sick in the toilet. She got a cup of water and knelt beside him. His skin was clammy. "Bella," he gasped.

She held his gaze. Panic danced in his black eyes, his pupils dilated, the whites glittering.

"I'm fighting," he gasped. "I am."

"Me, too," she promised.

They wept together silently, watching the tears spill from each other's eyes.

* * *

At home, Bella sat on Charlie's couch and sobbed on Embry's shoulder until she was exhausted and numb. He kept telling her that everything would be okay, sitting beside her with an arm around her shoulders.

"You don't know how strong he is," he said.

She closed her eyes and inhaled the scent of Jacob from the shirt Embry wore.

"When I look in his head, I can't see the love. It's not like he keeps it in a certain place. I can't see it because it's everywhere; his brain is like a sponge, and you're the air that fills every tiny space."

She sighed. "Thank you."

"The imprint looks different. Like a soupy blur in Jared's, Sam's, and Quil's heads. More an urge than a thought. A compulsion."

"You're still reading that psychology book."

"I'm going to secretly diagnose everybody."

"Why?"

"Keeps me from looking in my own head."

She put her arm around his rib cage since his shoulders were too wide and gave a squeeze, and they sat that way for a long time.

When they'd first got home, Jared was waiting on the porch. He picked up the backpack of crystal animals and said, "Phew. It's like a cotton candy factory exploded in a sewer." Maybe I should keep it, Bella had said, since it bothers your nose. The boys looked at her skeptically. She said she could take good care of it, maybe put it in her room under her bed. "Oh, no, no, no," they said. In the kitchen, Embry helped himself to a lemon and a jar of cinnamon. He sprinkled the cinnamon into the backpack and squeezed lemon juice directly onto the animals. They sizzled. "Smells a little better," said Jared. Bella said again, "Maybe I should keep that," and the boys said, " _NO."_ Jared walked out the backdoor and into the woods.

"Mind if I raid your kitchen?" said Embry as they sat on the couch.

She started to get up.

"No, no, you stay here."

So she curled up against the arm of the couch under a brown afghan her grandmother had made. She almost wished it weren't spring break so she might go to school and distract herself. Worse, tomorrow night there was a party in La Push for Joy's birthday. Charlie had planned it as a surprise. All their friends would be there, some who knew about the wolves and some who didn't, which meant that the Pack would have to be aware of themselves all evening, only talking about ordinary things. And they would have to smile. Smile! Ha. She didn't know if she could pull it off.

Embry returned with a jar of peanut butter, a spoon, and two apples. "Want one?" No, she didn't. He emptied the jar, taking huge gloppy spoonfuls that would have made Bella choke, and ate both apples. Then he tugged on her till he got her flopped the other way, her head on a throw pillow on his lap, and he tucked the afghan around her and patted her shoulder. Putting his long legs up on the coffee table, he pointed the remote control at the television and found a gardening show.

"This is boring," she said.

"You really want any more excitement today?"

The watched an old lady prune dahlias.

"How'd you get here so fast?" she said.

"Hmm?"

"La Push to Forks in fifteen minutes?"

She felt his muscles stiffen, then loosen again as he sighed. "Shit. I ran."

"I thought you weren't going to phase anymore. They Ordered you not to. Both of them."

There was no need to mention, he thought, the presences that flanked him as he ran to Forks. It had been like racing down an alley while the forest blurred and on either side, a spirit or thing raced beside him on his left. He wouldn't look at or listen to it. He felt the presence of a second one on his right, and as they pressed closer he imagined a shield around himself, a tunnel of safety and solidity. _Wolf,_ he'd chanted to himself. _Body, feet, claws, tail, fur, snout, teeth, ears, blood and bone and beating heart._ He let one arrow of thought fly, knowing Jared would catch it and come. Once, he'd risked searching for Jacob's heart, but he got confused with Paul's again, and Paul's heart looked like a hurting child had slashed black and red crayons over a sheet of newsprint until the paper tore. Then the presences narrowed in on him and he forced them back with _Bone! I am solid bone! I am body and blood!_

"You needed me," was all he said.

He imagined also saying that for her, he could be a very bad dog and force both Alphas' muzzles into the dirt, but that was untrue. He had no idea how he'd flung off the Order. Probably if he'd remembered it, he'd have had to use his mom's car, but he hadn't thought at all; he'd just reacted. The Pack's leadership had a few holes in it, and maybe because he was an Alpha's brother, he got to be sassy now and then about Orders. _For you, I could be a bad, bad dog._ It was sort of exciting to imagine saying that. Like a superhero in a movie. But he knew, as he smoothed his hand over this girl's hair until she fell asleep, that he didn't want her; he just wanted to feel the way Jacob felt about someone.

Also he wanted to— wanted to— he wanted to know the feeling of somebody's skin against his. A _girl_ somebody, he amended. Last summer, at the end of the canoe journey, he'd stolen a few kisses with a Haida puller, Heather. Her house had no phone. _How is that even possible?_ _Was it her parents' version of living traditionally?_ It was honestly kind of weird. Maybe that was why she'd been eager to sneak off with him. He supposed he was reasonably okay looking. And she'd liked that he was shy. Easy to tease, in the right way. He thought he'd really liked her, but now that he could see into the others' heads, he knew it had been mostly curiosity.

They'd flirted at the salmon bake, at the dances, at the story circles. And twice, she'd tapped him on the shoulder where he lay in his sleeping bag on the gymnasium floor with the other pullers, and he'd followed her to the back of her parents' garden. Behind her shed, behind rows of raspberry canes, he learned to sloppily kiss. She unhooked her bra, pulled it slowly out of her sleeves, and invited him to touch her beneath her shirt. God, he wished he could have seen what he was touching. Wondrously, he lifted her small breasts and brushed his thumbs over the most delicate places that made her shiver.

So far, he had kept these memories from Paul. From everyone except Quil. _Must have been nice,_ sighed Quil. _Wait, are you blushing? What the fuck, Emb, how can you blush in your head?_ Shut up, Embry had replied. He imagined drawing a curtain over his thoughts. _A blushy-pink curtain,_ Quil scoffed. _Nice. Hey, what's behind there?_

Private stuff.

The pack mind offered an awkward view into everyone else's intimate thoughts. He did _not_ need to know how Kim squeaked or how it had hurt her the first few times. He was a little angry at Jared for it. Dumbass. He didn't need to see Emily's scarred hand turning off the lights. Or Leah's— Leah's everything. It made him cringe. He'd thrown Sam an imaginary tablecloth. _Visualize yourself putting this over those memories,_ he'd snarled. Bless him, Sam tried. Quil didn't have sexy memories to share, but he frequently thumbed through his favorite magazines. _That stuff is so fake and weird,_ he'd told him. _Then quit looking,_ Quil had replied. Jacob's head was a blend of fantasy and fact; Jake got angry when others peeked, so Embry had offered him an imaginary tablecloth, too. _How do I work this?_ wondered Jacob. As for Paul, he'd spent several weeks sharing things that confused the pack. Who were these girls? _Wait a minute, is this pretend?_ Embry had eventually said. _Your sex life is appalling. Appallingly non-existent._

He wished he'd never teased Paul about that. Paul had only intensified the white inferno of hatred that blinded them when they tried to look in his head. And in return, he needled Embry, finding his sore spots. His appearance. His value to the pack. His desperation to restore his GPA to a college scholarship-worthy number. Paul also created new insecurities regarding the general quality of his— Well, it was very personal. But Embry had been so worried he'd borrowed Leah's medical textbook. He wasn't exactly going to _ask_ somebody to take a look in his pants and evaluate things. Nor was he going to poke his mind into other people's pants. He couldn't stare at other guys in the locker room, and he couldn't look it up online from school. The textbook offered reassuring pictures and numbers.

 _For fuck's sake,_ he snarled to Paul. _I'm perfectly normal! Asswipe._

 _Had you goin' there, didn't I?_ Paul replied. _Had you pissing yourself for a week._

 _In fact, like my GPA, I'm a bit above average. Ha._

 _You jacked off to the textbook to measure yourself, didn't you?_

 _Will you— Fuck off, Paul. Your GPA is pitiful._

Thank god they were all boys. He wondered what a girl would think if she could see into the pack mind. It would be horrible.

There was a little dark spot on the pillow near Bella's mouth. What was that? The fabric looked damp. Was that drool? Damn it. He visualized an eraser altering this image so that later, if he showed it, the rest of the pack wouldn't see that part. As Bella slept, he slouched until he could rest his head on the back of the couch. On the gardening show, the lady was snipping dahlias for a bouquet: red, orange, pink, and yellow. He closed his eyes and looked at them in his mind until he, too, slipped into a dream.

* * *

The Chinook Pharmacy did not sell perfume. It sold fragranced body sprays and Fancy Facsimiles, "impressions" of popular perfumes. Fancy Facsimiles seemed to be a knock-off brand that aspired to be like Designer Imposters, the original bargain-brand, copy-cat perfumes. "If you like Calvin Klein's 'Obsession,' read one Fancy orange spray can, you'll love our 'Obfuscation.'" A blue can with bird designs said, "If you like 'Wind Song,' you'll love our 'Evening Flute.'"

"Smells nice," said Charlie. He had come home from work early to buy Joy a birthday gift, and Bella, despite her exhaustion, accompanied him as she'd promised. She was glad to have a distraction.

"This does not smell nice," she replied. "It smells like ninety-nine cents." Moreover, she did not want Charlie to give Joy anything like an 'Evening Flute.' As far as she was concerned, her father had no 'Evening Flute' and Joy did not know how to play one. "No way."

"I guess I shouldn't throw away five dollars on something that smells like only ninety-nine cents," joked Charlie.

Embry slouched in the pharmacy's doorway, his hands in his pockets, trying to ignore his cramping stomach. It was nearly dinner time.

When Charlie'd come home, Bella tearfully told him about Jacob. It took a long time because she had to explain imprinting, too.

Her father frowned. "Ducks imprint."

Embry yawned, stretched, and folded up the brown afghan.

"They hatch," said Charlie, "and imprint on the first thing they see, usually the mama duck. _That's_ imprinting. What dummy came up with the name for this phenomenon? This thing that happened to Jacob?"

"Not me," said Embry, raising his hands in a not-gonna-touch-that gesture.

"That's not the point!" cried Bella.

"Or it's a term for pressing a design onto paper," said Charlie. "'Imprint?' Is this some kind of metaphor?"

"Semantics," said Embry.

"Like your mind is a piece of paper," said Charlie, "and the sight of somebody presses a mark on your brain? I've had a hard day. Now you're telling me your boyfriend has fallen in love with some bird in a nursing home?" Here he winked at Embry, who said, "Ha. Some bird."

"Is that a joke?" she cried. "This is an emergency!"

"Sweetie. He's not going to marry an old lady."

She blinked at him.

"And he's not a duck."

Embry snorted. "More semantics."

"Look. He's had a crush on you since he was… How old?"

"Six," supplied Embry.

"And honestly, sweetie, you two are extremely attached to one another. It's probably healthy for him to see other people."

"This is not funny!" she cried. "He can hardly talk! Hardly breathe! He's with her right now!"

"It seems to be overwhelming at first," Embry said. "This thing."

"And she thinks he's his great-grandfather!" she cried.

"Do you know what compartmentalizing is?" said Charlie. "Oh, who am I talking to; of course you do."

"Some bird," smirked Embry. "Ha ha."

She stalked up to her room and played her guitar with fingers that shook, hoping it would calm her down. Meanwhile, Embry telephoned Sam's house. Jared was there, acting as Alpha, because Sam and Ellen were still somewhere in the woods. They discussed the fate of Vera's animals, and it was hard to make a call on that since both Alphas and Quil were away. The pack _had_ decided to destroy the stuff today, though. Paul was inspecting it right now. Embry heard him call out that it was much, much more powerful than Bella's beacons or anchors or whatever they were. They chilled him; they hurt his lungs and brain; he didn't think they should explode them anywhere near the village. "Viking funeral," said Embry. Jared said his dad had a bow for deer hunting. In the background, he heard Paul say, "Fuck yeah."

 _It's nice to know,_ thought Embry, _that Paul can occasionally experience joy._

Jared's plan was to destroy the stuff, then send Paul to patrol a defensive arc around Forks till 2:00 a.m., when he'd take over. He assigned Embry to moral support duty for Bella since he wanted to remain human.

"But I saw what you did back there," said Jared.

"Well, you're the only one. Let's just never mention it."

"Hard to keep secrets in the Pack."

" _You_ can. I know you can."

"And I know what _you_ can do. Think it over. I could train you. Partly."

"Freak," said Paul in the background, and Embry hung up without saying goodbye.

Here he was now on moral support duty, lolling in the pharmacy doorway. As Charlie uncapped more pink and purple perfume spray cans, Embry said, "Nope. Nope. Nope. Ew, no."

"You two are awful picky," grumbled Charlie.

"If you like Elizabeth Taylor's 'White Diamonds,'" read his next choice, "you'll love our 'Cubic Zirconia.'"

"Who's Elizabeth Taylor?" said Bella.

Her father pinched the bridge of his nose, and they left the pharmacy, Charlie muttering about how Renee had raised her in a desert like a lizard under a rock. On the way to Port Angeles, Bella and Embry rode in the back of the cruiser. It gave Embry the creeps, but he told himself to just enjoy the sunset. Pink clouds floated over the pines. He hoped he didn't have any sap on his jeans to mess up the Chief's car. In the city, Charlie treated them to a pizza dinner and they found some nicer perfume in a little shop: a sweet, bright, but subtle scent in a sparkling bottle with a white ribbon on it. It even made Bella smile.

"Smells like sunshine," she said. "You know. If sunlight had a smell. And oranges and roses."

"How can you smell more than one thing at a time?" wondered Charlie.

 _Oh, you have no idea,_ thought Embry.

Stars shone on the way home. He felt as tired as ever, but he made himself stay awake to appreciate the experience. Bella and Charlie talked about the cruiser and why Charlie hadn't bought himself a regular car. He said it was more affordable to take the mileage for personal errands out of his paycheck. Ever since she was born, he'd been saving for her college education. Just a little here and there, however he could manage.

"Aw, Dad," said Bella. "Thank you."

He smiled at her in the rearview mirror and turned on the stereo, playing Emmylou Harris and Gram Parsons singing "Love Hurts." It was on repeat. Miles and miles. Bella groaned for him to stop it, and he pretended the controls were broken. "Ooh, ooh, love hurts," he sang in his twangy voice. It was funny, thought Embry, how sometimes a sad song could make you smile, even Bella, who was rolling her eyes. She told him about the punishment her father and Harry had inflicted on her and Leah. Later, said Bella, Leah had inflicted Pink Floyd on her as well.

"There's nothing wrong with Pink Floyd," said Charlie and Embry at the same time.

Back home, Charlie scooped three bowls of chocolate ice cream, and they all sat on the couch. When he flipped on the TV, Charlie said, "I love the gardening channel."

"You do?" said Bella.

"Shh," said Charlie.

They listened to instructions on how to prune fruit trees. Blessedly boring, thought Bella. When the program was over, Charlie told Embry he'd drive him home and went out to warm up the cruiser. Bella followed Embry to the door, where he stood with his hands shoved in his pockets, looking at his feet.

"Thanks," she said. "I feel a little better."

He whispered, "You have a nice dad," and hurried out so she wouldn't see how pink his ears were.

* * *

Figuring out how to make a flaming arrow was only a little bit easier than destroying Vera's animals. Paul, who enjoyed fire almost as much as Ellen and weapons of all sorts, took on the task. Once Jared had fetched his father's bow, Paul helped himself to the quiver of steel shafted arrows. In Sam's backyard, he experimented with tying rags soaked in kerosene to the tips. Emily stood on the porch, offering suggestions.

Less than twenty-four hours ago, she had held his head on her lap and spooned broth into him until he fell asleep, warm and nourished for the first time in nearly a week. His shoulder had healed rapidly, now that the poison was out of his bloodstream, and his mind and heart had healed, too—or at least, they had regained their former characteristics. He took pleasure in the scent of the kerosene and the zucchini bread Emily had baking in the oven. Pleasure in cold steel and the anticipation of blowing shit up.

"Those rags are too heavy," said Emily. "They'll throw off the trajectory."

She unnerved him—her mixed innards, vulnerable and fierce, submissive and defiant—so he turned his back to her. Each time his experiments fell short of Sam's firepit, his target, he felt her roll her eyes. "Piss off," he snarled, and she went inside.

Emily telephoned Joy, who had a decent internet connection, and asked her to look up instructions. Then she followed Paul and Jared to the beach just as the sun was going down. In the dim light, as the sun set in a pink and orange glow, her scars disappeared, and not just the ones on the outside. Grinning, she unrolled a kitchen towel full of supplies on a driftwood log and said, "I would really, really like to blow something up today."

"This is basically a bomb," said Jared.

"Woo hoo!"

Paul said, "We can take it from here," to which she said dryly, "Really?" and he turned his back to her again.

According to a website devoted to camping, a flaming arrow could be made by shaving the gritty material off sparkler sticks, the kind used on the Fourth of July, wrapping this powder in feather-light cheese cloth, wrapping a steel shafted arrow in the cheesecloth, and sprinkling it with kerosene. _Do not try this at home,_ said the website. The target object should also be soaked in kerosene. Luckily, Ellen had plenty and a surprise horde of firecrackers under her bed. Good thing Sam didn't know about that. With a paring knife, Emily shaved the flammable material onto a paper plate as the boys walked down the deserted beach with the bow.

"Did you figure out how to work this?" said Jared, turning it over. "Maybe we should practice."

The boys chose a log about forty yards away as a target. Though they could slash and shred and piss on anything they wanted, they couldn't aim for the life of them. It surprised them.

"I already practiced," said Paul. "Got nothing. We're invincible, so this thing must be broken."

"Give it," said Jared. "Tighten your core. Nock the arrow—three fingers—and pull it back near your cheekbone. Feet wider apart." He imitated his father's stance and hit a log, just not the one he was aiming at.

"How're you doing?" called Emily.

"Robin Hood," they assured her.

She snorted and said she'd make three arrows, just in case they needed more than one shot.

"Maybe you should get your dad," Paul said quietly. "He's been a hunter for years, right?"

Jared replied, "Yeah, but he ain't actually hit a deer yet."

Fortunately, the tide was going out. This would work to their advantage, carrying their target away from the village. Unfortunately, a Viking funeral called for a boat, and the only boat to be had was Sam's aluminum rowboat. He'd be mad, but it was their only choice. They had already rowed it to the beach and filled it with small pieces of driftwood, crumpled newspaper, and dried grass. Jared volunteered to swim it out past the breakers. The plan was for him to swim back to safety before Paul blew the thing up, and they needed to get it done fast because the sun was almost gone. Paul took a few more practice shots with an improved stance. At last he hit the right log. Jared poured a gallon of kerosene over the boat, stem to stern, taking special care to soak the backpack containing Vera's animals, and waded into the cold ocean.

"It's been nice knowing you," said Paul. Most days, Jared was the only one whom he remotely respected, neither a push-over nor a pampered princeling, neither a self-loathing, runty worm nor a clown infatuated with a child. Fuck-wads. His gratitude for some of these fuck-wads' saving his life was fading and his long-held opinions resurfacing. _No man is an island._ Who had said that? One of his teachers. School was dull and confining, and some days he wanted to smash the windows and run and run and run. And that was before he phased. Now he could run, but there were ropes around his ankles. Ropes called Sam and Jacob, Embry and Quil. _No man is an island except me._ Soon, he thought, he'd be strong enough to throw them off. Two would give him trouble and two would roll over. One of the stronger ones might be onto him, so it was best to detach as soon as possible.

Emily brought the arrows down to the water's edge. Each missile was tied neatly with sewing thread, which was almost weightless, trussed up like a little white sausage of doom. Almost too pretty to burn. "Good?" she said.

He grunted and took an arrow.

Together they stood watching the waves. As they rose, the setting sun glowed through them, making them turquoise, pale green, and gray blue. As they fell, they slid back into darkness. Wind coming off the water blew Emily's hair back from her temples; it fluttered behind her like black ribbons. Like Sam's color, he thought, remembering the Pack's ribbon metaphor while running together: black, green, pink, purple, light blue, and orange—ribbons that wove together and separated—ribbons flapping from the tail of a kite blown loose. Jake had pinned him with purple, a stupid color, he thought. He looked at Emily's face in profile against the purple evening sky. Two scarred ridges on her chin marred her silhouette. Or perhaps made it more interesting. He looked at the shape of her as the darkness came down, her face, her body, her loose jacket. Her chin was ridged and her hair, whipping behind her, was Sam's black ribbons.

Jared crawled out of the surf, shaking water from his hair. In the setting sun, Paul could barely make out the glint of the metal stern of the rowboat. "Fast," said Jared. "Water's moving."

The first arrow they lit fizzled so bright Paul had to squint as he aimed. It fell short of the boat and winked out. So did the second.

"It's okay," Jared. "Plan B. I could go get the boat." He shivered on the beach in his undershorts. "Or wait; I'll bless this arrow."

Paul did not waste his breath on a sigh for Jared's mom's hippie bullshit. Jared spoke to the third arrow and held it up in the sky. Then he lay it on the sand and bent over it, moving his hands as if pulling spiderwebs. Bad spirits, he explained. Getting rid of them. "Is that a Quileute thing?" asked Emily. "No. Reiki." Paul said, "Gimme that." He nocked the arrow and drew on his anger, which had never failed him, to guide it. Emily held a lighter under the arrowhead, and once it fizzled to life, he closed his eyes, envisioned the explosion, and let it fly.

"Bad luck," said Jared.

He opened his eyes to see the third arrow wink out as it fell into the water.

"As yer Betta," began Jared in his country music accent, "I'm a' Order you a'—"

Paul merely cocked an eyebrow at the Betta, who sighed, "Fine. But only cuz I ain' so cruel as to abuse the Orderin' system," and loped down to the water. The wind had picked up, even in the short time he'd stood on the beach, and when he waded out to his knees, a wave hit him as high as his hips, making him shriek.

"Didn't know you could sing that high," said Paul.

Emily called for him to wait. From behind the log she'd used as a workbench, she retrieved a fourth arrow—and a smirk.

Paul reached for it. "I'm supernaturally good at this."

She reached for the bow. "You still think that?"

"Wolf."

"Adult."

"You're not—"

"Nineteen. And now you say…?"

He stared.

Jared said, "You're supposed to say 'Thank you.' Or, 'Sorry I'm such a dick.' Hurry up because it's floating away."

"Thank you." Paul swiped the arrow.

"You're welcome. Boy. Define 'parabola.'"

He replied that he didn't feel like doing that, so she edged behind him, her right hand on his elbow, left hand on his left forearm, her chin almost on his right shoulder. Instead, he felt her nose there and her warm breath. "Can you see it?" she whispered. "Because I can't." It pissed him off that he couldn't quite speak, so he just angled his body in the right direction. It brought him too close to hers, and then he couldn't quite breathe. "Up," she whispered, lightly guiding his arms. "Up. Feel the wind?" He could barely nod. She nudged him to angle the arrow about a centimeter upwind and whispered, "Let go." It took him a second to realize she meant the arrow. They sent an arc of flame over the sea. As it flew, she kissed the back of his neck, and when he flinched, she pinched his ass.

The explosion knocked them on the sand. A moment later, an enormous, freezing cold wave washed over them, stirring the detritus on shore and dragging them down the slope of the beach. Jared caught Emily by the wrist, pulling her from the path of a rolling log, and Paul scrambled for a grip on one of the barnacle-encrusted rocks at the water's edge. The tiny shells sliced his palms. For several moments, none of them could hear. Then Emily whooped, both fists raised, as Jared kept his arm around her waist and a trickle of blood seeped from her nose. Another waved crashed over her lap, seaweed and sticks and a dead, silver fish, blood leaking from its every orifice, flowed past her and back to the sea "We did it!" Pushing her soaked hair out of her face, she made a noise to imitate a cheering stadium. "Clallam County Fair, junior level archery champion, 2004 _and_ 2005!"

"You've been holding out on us," Paul spat. The salt water stung his cuts and his head was full of adrenaline. "Make a fucking resume, bitch. Hunts, guts, shoots, bakes, fucks with people's heads."

"I got you to hold still," she snarled. "And I hope Sam sees your boner in your memory and kicks your ass."

He whipped a handful of sand at her face, which Jared blocked. "Everybody's holding out," he sighed.

* * *

Jacob was an hour into his imprint when Bella left, slumped against the wall in the old ladies' bathroom. Sounds on the roof and whispers in the garden had told him that Embry had taken delivery of the crystal figures Bella had had the presence of mind to smuggle outside. She'd come to help him when he vomited, and he promised her he'd fight this. It heartened him to hear her say that she'd fight, too. He tried to concentrate on her now and feel comforted that Embry was with her. _Thank God for Bella._ _Thinking straight when I can't._

 _Yes, you can,_ he told himself. _Think your way out of this._ He envisioned himself leaving, just walking back down the hall, slipping into the dining room and out again by the side door. Last summer, during the canoe journey, he and the other paddlers powered through a bad patch of high winds and waves with the help of the skipper. He talked to them, leading them through a shared vision of arriving safely at Shi Shi Beach just south of Neah Bay. They sang together, imagining the wide, bright beach and the sound of sand grinding under their hull. He remembered how Paul's eyes were snapping when they hit the beach; he looked at Jacob, his partner, and grinned. They had shared something. Now, perspiring in the bathroom, he envisioned leaving this place with a rabid strength like Paul's.

At his first step, his stomach revolted. He made it to the toilet, his body heaving for the second time with nothing more to spill. Dimly, he was away that the old man in a wheelchair had entered. He didn't speak, and Jacob wiped his lips with a wad of tissue. After a minute or two, he felt steady enough to crawl to the sink to rinse his mouth. The old man frowned at him as he sat cross-legged and put his face in his hands.

"I had hoped we were finished with mysteries surrounding that woman," he said quietly. When Jacob didn't speak, he continued with, "I'm assuming you're not a vampire."

"I don't know what you're talking about," mumbled Jacob.

"I'm too old for lies. Give me a reason why I shouldn't call the cops."

Jacob raised his head. _I got forty reasons. Maybe fifty._ He decided just to offer five. "My great-grandfather was her friend. As you can see—" he gestured to the toilet "—I'm suddenly overwhelmed with the desire to be her friend, too. I'm not a vampire. I fucking hate vampires." He remembered to apologize to an adult for cursing. "And," he added, resuscitating a smidgeon of his sense of humor, "I'm in good with the cops."

The old man said he'd take that for now but expected more information soon. When he rolled out to speak to Vera and Albertine, Jacob put his head in his hands again and tried to push this feeling from his brain.

 _Old lady. No._

 _Old lady. No._

 _Bella. Yes._

 _Get up. Leave._

 _Come on…._

 _Damn it. No._

He saw himself kneeling by Vera's bed in those first few dazed minutes, weeping about how he'd been looking for her all his life. Why had he said that? He'd felt joyful, relieved, yet horrified and short of breath. He felt torn in two. He felt whole. He felt sick.

The white bathroom ceiling was a poor substitute for a starry sky, but he tried to imagine being in the field with his mother and sisters, learning the constellations. In his memory, it was July. The night was warm, he lay with his sisters on a blanket, and their mother let them stay up till ten o'clock. She had brought her guitar. He couldn't remember her voice now, but he knew it had been high and beautiful.

 _Mom?_ he thought, looking at the ceiling. Blank and cold. He closed his eyes instead and saw the stars.

When she had finished her songs, his mother lay beside them. The twins were ten or eleven; he must have been six. He felt like he was glowing inside, like there was a precious star in his chest. Now he knew it was because he felt loved—completely, unconditionally, and unceasingly.

Sometimes he went to church, not necessarily to talk to God, but to talk to his mom. He could feel her there, in the quiet after everyone else had gone, and he could feel her in the starry night. Wherever she was, he knew she was loving him still.

 _Mom, can you help me?_

He could only imagine the star in his chest and hope it was part of her spirit.

He heard Vera's roommate and the old man leave. Must be dinner time, he figured. Then a great shudder went through his body, and he leaped up, frightened. Somewhere, something terrible had happened. He rushed from the bathroom. Outside, he could see the daylight was almost gone. Vera lay on the floor, her arms and legs trembling, and her blue eyes rolled back. Lifting her gently, he cradled her to his chest. She weighed almost nothing; it was like holding air in a dressing gown.

 _Mom! Help!_

His eyes settled on the telephone. As he picked it up, he felt blessedly calm, speaking to the 911 dispatcher. The old woman became still and he sat on her bed, holding her on his lap, warming her. It seemed to be someone else's voice saying the words to her half-conscious form as he kissed her forehead: "I'll always be here. I always have been."

* * *

Not long after Charlie left to drive Embry home and Bella was thinking of going to bed, she received a phone call from Albertine. Vera had had a stroke. She was in the hospital now, and Bella's friend was with her. Bella could hear tears in Albertine's voice; Albertine said she hadn't driven in years, she certainly didn't have a car anymore, and she wondered—

"Of course," said Bella. "I'll pick you up."

She scrambled for her coat. For a split second she thought that if Vera died, Jacob would belong to her again. How incredibly convenient to get rid of his imprint in less than twenty-four hours. In the next moment she wondered what that would do to Jake. A moment later, she mustered some concern for Vera.

She scribbled a note for Charlie, scooped whatever was lying on the counter into a bag for Jake—two bananas, a box of cereal—and hurried to her truck. Albertine was waiting at the door of Olympic Acres when she pulled up under the portico; Mr. Horowitz saw them off. At the Forks Hospital, her truck shuddered as she nosed it into a parking spot and killed the ignition.

It was a small building with a small staff, capable of stabilizing a patient for short term crisis care but not well suited to long term care. If Vera didn't recover quickly, would Jacob end up at her bedside in Port Angeles or Aberdeen every day? She couldn't worry about it now. She and Albertine had reached the reception area. "Vera Moss?" they inquired of the lady behind the desk.

"You family?" said the woman, barely looking up. She had gray hair and the attitude of one close to retirement.

"No."

"Family only." She pointed to a plastic frame on the desk that displayed visiting hours and limitations. "I'm sorry."

Perhaps Jacob had been turned away, too. He must be going mad. Or had he claimed to be a grandson?

"Please," she said. "She doesn't have any family. Just friends and one, um, grandson. He's probably— He needs me. And Vera needs _us._ "

Albertine squeezed her hand.

The woman hesitated. "I. D.?"

Albertine hadn't brought hers, but Bella fumbled for her wallet and driver's license. She didn't think showing identification was a normal part of a hospital visit, but whatever; if it helped, she'd hand it over.

"You Chief Swan's daughter?"

"Yes."

"Interesting. Chief Billy Black's son is upstairs with his 'grandma.' I don't appreciate the lie, but she looks— Well, check in at the nurses' station."

"Thank you." Bella skittered down the hall, pressed the button for the elevator, and looked back, waiting for Albertine. The old woman followed with one hand skimming a hand railing that ran the length of the hall. Bella stared at the fluorescent lights, the curtained alcoves, a wheeled tray spread with shiny metal tools disinfectant, an empty gurney, and an occupied gurney, and she realized she was _in a hospital._

This place held horrors worse than Olympic Acres, not only full of old people, but full of ill people, perhaps dying people. Human life ebbing away, suffering. A woman in black moving a sloppy, gray mop over the floor looked suddenly like Charon or the Grim Reaper. _These are vampire attitudes,_ she told herself. _Getting old is normal._ The elevator doors, trying to close, kept bumping her foot she'd inserted between them and she focused on its discomfort to distract herself.

On the second floor, Albertine held her hand as they searched for the nurses' station. It felt odd. Who was managing this situation? _Me?_

"Turn right," said another spooky, black-clad custodian.

At the nurses' station, two people in blue scrubs sat behind the desk; a third nurse moved down another hall, pushing a wheeled contraption for taking blood pressure _. Holy crow, is there going to be blood in here?_ Again, she tried to force those thoughts away as the nurses looked up, puzzled. Albertine was pressing a tissue to her nose, so she managed to ask for Vera.

"It's ten o'clock. How did you get in here?"

She offered her driver's license.

"Charlie Swan's kid?"

"Yes."

"Come."

For a moment, she feared they would be escorted out, but as they followed the nurse farther and farther from the elevator, she realized she'd actually done it, run two gauntlets on her father's reputation. Never before had she thought to play the Chief card. What else might it get her? Was this how Jacob got in, too? Was this fair? _Shut up. This is fine._

"How is she?" whispered Albertine when they reached Vera's room.

"Stable. Don't wake her," said the nurse. The stroke was severe he said, but he expected her to recover most of her movement and speech. "Your friend called 911 right away. Probably saved her life."

Bella thanked him, and they tiptoed into Vera's room. Behind a sliding beige curtain, they found the old woman asleep with her head slightly elevated. Her mouth was open, her nose upturned in sharp relief, as if her paper-thin skin scarcely covered the bone, and the tendons in her neck sagged. A machine monitored her pulse and blood oxygen level, a thin, transparent tube delivered oxygen to her nostrils, and there was an electric blanket placed over her regular blankets. Beside her, pale and trembling in a stiff, plastic chair, Jacob sat holding her frail, wasted hand. His voice cracked when he said her name. Bella's name.

She led him to a small, vinyl covered loveseat below the window as Albertine took his place beside Vera. "Shhh…" said Bella, hugging him as he collapsed on her shoulder. Through weepy fragments of whispers, she pieced together what had happened: Vera's fall, his phone call, riding in the ambulance beside her. It terrified him. He kept picturing his mother in an ambulance after the car accident.

Billy had been transported in a second ambulance, and his mother died alone on the way to the hospital. Sue Clearwater came to school to quietly remove the Black children and drive to Forks. When they saw their father lying on the white bed, his face black and blue, his legs broken, they were afraid to approach him. After he told them, the girls fell clutching each other as Billy tried to roll to his side to comfort them, and Jacob bolted. He could find her; he could help her; he could prove the doctors wrong. Sue tried to hold him, but he clawed and struggled, screaming, " _NO! NO! NO!"_ It was February. He was barely eight. When he broke free he ran down the same white-tiled hall they'd brought Vera down tonight and into the parking lot where Charlie, just arriving, caught him. They sat on a curb as he cried in his lap. Charlie wrapped him in his coat.

He couldn't tell Bella all of this. Even the smell of Charlie's body, coffee and canvas, and the darkness under his coat where some of the awfulness went away for a moment were too private to share with even that man's daughter. But he told her enough. "I hate this place," he whispered. "It scares me."

Bella's fear of blood suddenly seemed petty and shameful. Her misery over the imprint, more so.

"Why am I here?" he wept. "The im— Everything is wrong. Why would it pull me into this place?"

"It's okay," she said.

"It's not."

"Shh…. It'll be okay." That was bullshit, but she knew how comforting those words were. After all, she had learned from the best.

Vera drew in a rattling breath that made Albertine sit up straight and Jacob shudder.

Why indeed would the imprint pull him into this place? It seemed to be his personal hell, thought Bella. And, she realized, he'd already faced it for _her_ when she'd needed stitches after crashing the motorcycle. _Which I did to see Edward. Then_ I _dragged Jake here. And he never told me how scared he must have been, deep down. Looking for something unreal, I did_ this _to him._

"Jake, I'm sorry." She tried to explain why, but he only whispered, "Fuck, it doesn't matter." She decided not to insist that it did. Wiping his eyes and nose with a tissue, he whispered, "I'm sorry, too. For this," he gestured subtly to Vera.

"Doesn't matter," she whispered.

He teared up again.

"It really doesn't." A few hours ago, it did; it mattered terribly and her heart was breaking. But now— Seeing him like this— Seeing Vera like this— And Albertine— She gave him a crooked smile. Very, very quietly, she whispered, "You're not going to run away with her or marry her, right? You still love me?"

"Of course!"

"Then it's okay." She kissed him to show that she meant it.

"I don't deserve you."

"We don't deserve each other."

He made a tiny, snuffly snort that was almost like laughter.

Charlie arrived then, bringing Bella's coat. She introduced him to Albertine. The old woman shook his hand and excused herself to talk to the nurses.

"This your mama duck?" said Charlie, jerking a thumb at Vera.

Jacob stared at him.

"Lame joke. Sorry." He squeezed onto the small couch and put an arm around Jacob's shoulders. They sat companionably silent until Albertine returned. Charlie offered to take her home, and she kissed Vera's papery cheek before she left, asking Bella to call if anything changed.

"If anything— happens," she said.

When they had gone, Bella realized that Charlie hadn't tried to make her go home, too. She figured it was because she was on spring break. Jacob tipped his head back against the window behind the couch. It looked horribly uncomfortable and the glass must be cold, thought Bella, but in moments he was asleep, snoring softly with his mouth open. She moved to the small plastic chair to study Vera.

She looked very much the same as when she'd first timidly followed Angela into her and Albertine's room. Her pale, dry skin was nearly transparent, revealing blue veins on her arms and hands, and her patchy, tufty white hair showed her scalp. Her eyes were sunken in purple shadows. Bella looked at the green lights on the monitors, watching them change with Vera's slow, shallow breathing. It was good to have a monitor, she thought, because by just looking at her, it was hard to tell if Vera was alive. Her body was so still and cold. Bella gently stroked her wrist with her thumb, and her bones felt as fragile as an eggshell.

"Please be nice to him," she whispered. "Also, uh, get better."

Around two o'clock, Vera made a sound that startled Bella awake. She'd nodded off in the chair beside her bed. "Eem," rasped Vera, opening her milky blue eyes.

"Here!" said Jacob, tumbling off the sofa. He knelt at her beside, pressing her hand to his lips. "Right here."

Bella put her hand on Jacob's shoulder. Maybe this imprint was like Quil's, she thought. Comforting somebody. At least she hoped it was. In the back of her mind was the thought that maybe Quil would wait for Claire to grow up. When she was eighteen, he would be thirty-one. Kind of gross, she thought; she couldn't imagine dating someone thirteen years older. Or would Quil become a brother figure? _Good luck, Claire. No one will ever be good enough for you to date because your brother will screen them all and he has claws._

Comforting. She hoped that was it. Vera needed someone, and Jake was willing to pretend to be someone else to do it. He sat on the floor, resting his head against the mattress and reaching an arm above him to hold Vera's hand. She fell asleep again. Jacob did, too. Bella put a pillow on the floor beside him and tried to sleep with her hand over his other one. _Like a chain of support,_ she thought. _Like a train. A stinkin' circus train._

She told herself that Jacob's emotional rollercoaster today was far more gut-churning than hers, and she had promised to be supportive, but now that he wasn't looking at her, she couldn't help feeling a little sorry for herself. Smudging away a tear of self pity, and another tear of anger, she patted Jacob's hand and tried to sleep, too. Sometime before dawn, she felt warm hands under her shoulders and knees, and her eyes flew open.

"Shh," said Embry.

He carried her to the tiny sofa, slid the window shut, put her pillow on his lap, and settled her beside him. He'd even brought the brown afghan from Charlie's couch. Later, he'd tell her how he scaled the wall with it tied around his shoulders like a cape, feeling part criminal, part super hero. She fell asleep again as he stroked his hand over her hair.

* * *

 _Thank you for reading._

 _I considered called this_ _chapter "It's All in Your Head" because so much of it IS in the characters' heads. Where's the action? Jake imprints, they blow up the stuff, Charlie buys a present for Joy. Also, Jake follows his imprint into his personal hell, and Bella tries to rearrange her horror into supportiveness. Embry thinks about romance. Thinking, thinking, thinking... Some people call this navel gazing. I think that's funny._

 _Helpful questions..._

 _1\. Is Embry being a little too helpful to Bella? Is he stepping on Jake's toes, perhaps, in the cuddle department?_

 _2\. Did Emily fuck with Paul's head? If so, is that wrong? Why or why not?_

 _3\. If you had to rate Bella's handling of the imprint on a scale of 1-10, where 1 = Bella has hardly changed since Edward left her, and 10 = Bella is acting with maturity, selflessness, courage, compassion, and all manner of other good qualities, what score would you give her? Why? How could (or should) she improve?_

 _4\. How would you rate Jake's handling of the imprint on a scale of 1-10, where 1 = no awareness of anyone other than his imprint, and 10 = not at all distracted from loving Bella, what score would you give him? Why? Could (or should) he change/improve somehow?_

 _5\. Charlie doesn't commiserate with Bella; he doesn't even give her a hug. Does he care? Is he too flippant? Is he still a "nice dad," as Embry says, without demonstrative sympathy? Or did he mess up as a parent by not sympathizing more?_

 _6\. If this is an "all in your head" chapter, whose head was most interesting to visit? Why? Is there anyone whose head you do NOT want to visit, perhaps to keep that character mysterious or mythic or distant? Why?_

 _7\. Bits you liked best?_

 _Thank you, Readers. You guys are the best bits! Next chapter will have Sam dealing with the way others treat him. If you have insight, ideas, or inspiration, I'm all ears. This chapter is wide open right now. I am awaiting your comments with nervous hope._


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